
f 






Book_JB_a!L 



S3^ 






THE BRIDGEWATER TREATISES 

ON THE POWER, WISDOM AND GOODNESS OF GOD, 

AS MANIFESTED IN THE CREATION. 



TREATISE VII. 

ON THE HISTORY, HABITS AND INSTINCTS OF ANIMALS. 
BY THE REV. WILLIAM KIRBY, M.A. 



" C'est, la Bible a la main, que nous devons entrer dans le temple auguste 
de la Nature, pour bien comprendre la voix du Createur." 



Gar.de. 



Plate ^V 




I 

ON THE 






POWER, WISDOM AND GOODNESS OF GOD, 



-A.S MANIFESTED IN THE 



CREATION OF ANIMALS, 



THEIR HISTORY, HABITS AND INSTINCTS. 



BY THE 

REV. WILLIAM KIRBY, M.A. F.R.S. etc. 

RECTOR OF BARHAM. 



PHILADELPHIA: 

CAREY, LEA & BLANCHARD. 

1836. 






By Tranafar 



.or 



TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE 

CHARLES, 
BARON FARNBOROUGH, 

KNIGHT GRAND CROSS OF THE ORDER OF THE BATH, A MEMBER OF HIS MAJESTY'S 

MOST HONOURABLE PRIVY COUNCIL, AND ONE OF THE TRUSTEES 

OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM, 

THE FOLLOWING TREATISE, 

BY HIS PERMISSION, 

IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED, 

BY HIS lordship's OBLIGED AND OBEDIENT SERVANT, 



THE AUTHOR. 



NOTICE 



The series of Treatises, of which the present is one, is pub- 
lished under the following circumstances: 

The Right Honourable and Reverend Francis Henry, 
Earl of Bridgewater, died in the month of February 1829; 
and by his last Will and Testament, bearing date the 25th of 
February 1825, he directed certain Trustees therein named to 
invest in the public funds the sum of Eight thousand pounds 
sterhng; this sum, with the accruing dividends thereon, to be 
held at the disposal of the President, for the time being, of the 
Royal Society of London, to be paid to the person or persons 
nominated by him. The Testator further directed, that the 
person or persons selected by the said President should be ap- 
pointed to write, print, and publish one thousand copies of a 
work On the Power, Wisdom, and Goodness of God, as manifested 
in the Creation; illustrating such work by all reasonable arguments, 
as for instance the variety and formation of God's creatures in the 
animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms ; the effect of digestion, and 
thereby of conversion ; the construction of the hand of man, and an 
infinite variety of other arguments ; as also by discoveries ancient 
and modern, in arts, sciences, and the whole extent of literature. 
He desired, moreover, that the profits arising from the sale of 
the works so published should be paid to the authors of the 
works. 

The late President of the Royal Society, Davies Gilbert, Esq. 
requested the assistance of his Grace the Archbishop of Canter- 



Vlll 

bury and of the Bishop of London, in determining upon the 
best mode of carrying into effect the intentions of the Testator. 
Acting with their advice, and with the concurrence of a noble- 
man immediately connected with the deceased, Mr Davies 
Gilbert appointed the following eight gentlemen to write sepa- 
rate Treatises on the different branches of the subject as here 
stated : 

THE REV. THOMAS CHALMERS, D. D. 

PROFESSOR OF DIVINITy IN THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH. 

ON THE POWER, WISDOM, AND GOODNESS OF GOD 

AS MANIFESTED IN THE ADAPTATION 

OF EXTERNAL NATURE TO THE MORAL AND 

INTELLECTUAL CONSTITUTION OF MAN. 



JOHN KIDD, M. D. F. R. S. 

REGIUS PR0FES30R OF MEDICINE IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD. 

ON THE ADAPTATION OF EXTERNAL NATURE TO THE 
PHYSICAL CONDITION OF MAN. 



THE REV. WILLIAM WHEWELL, M. A. F. R. S. 

FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. 

ASTRONOMY AND GENERAL PHYSICS CONSIDERED WITH 
REFERENCE TO NATURAL THEOLOGY. 



SIR CHARLES BELL, K. G. H. F. R. S. L. Sl E. 

THE HAND: ITS MECHANISM AND VITAL ENDOWMENTS 
AS EVINCING DESIGN. 



PETER MARK ROGET, M. D. 

FKI.I.OW OF AND SECRETARY TO THE ROY K\. SOCIETY. 

ON ANIMAL AND VKGFTAKLE PHYSIOLOtiY 



IX 

THE REV. WILLIAM BUCKLAND, D. D. F. R. S. 

CAWON OF CHRIST CHURCH, AND PROFESSOR OF GEOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORO. 

ON GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY. 



THE REV. WILLIAM KIRBY, M. A. F. R. S. 

ON THE HISTORY, HABITS, AND INSTINCTS OF ANIMALS. 



WILLIAM PROUT, M. D. F. R. S. 

CHEMISTRY, METEOROLOGY, AND THE FUNCTION OF 

DIGESTION, CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE TO 

NATURAL THEOLOGY. 



His Royal Highness the Duke of Sussex, President of 
the Royal Society, having desired that no unneccessary delay 
should take place in the publication of the above mentioned 
treatises, they will appear at short intervals, as they are ready 
for pubUcation. 



2* 



CONTENTS. 



Explanation of Plates - - - - - xiii 

Introduction - - - . . xxi 

Chap. I. Creation of animals - - - . i 

II. Geographical Distribution of Ditto - - 24 

Migrations of Ditto - - - .47 

Local Distribution of Ditto - - - 69 

III. General Functions and Instincts of Ditto - 74 

IV. Functions and Instincts. Infusones - - 79 
V. Polypes - - 88 

VI. Radiaries - - 103 

VII. Tunicaries - - 117 

VIII. Bivalve Molluscans 126 

IX. Univalve Molluscans - 144 

X. Cephalopods - 163 

XI. Worms - - 171 

XII. Annelidans - 179 

XIII. Cirripedes and Crinoi- 

deans - - 189 

XIV. Entomostracan Condy- 

lopes - - 197 

XV. Crustacean Condylopes 208 

XVI. Myriapod Condylopes 223 

XVII. Motive, locomotive and prehensory organs - 239 

1. Rotatory organs - - - 241 

2. Tentacles - - - - - 242 

3. Suckers - - _ . 250 

4. Bristles - - • - - - 257 

5. Natatory organs - - . 259 

6. Wings ----- 266 

7. Steering organs - . - 274 

8. Legs - - . - - 277 



Xll CONTENTS. 

XVIII. Instinct in general - - - - 306 
XIX. Functions and Instincts, ^rachnidans, Pseuda- 

rachnidans, and Acaridan Condylopes - - 338 

XX. Insect Condylopes - 353 

XXI. — Fishes - - - 386 

XXII. Reptiles - - 406 

XXIII. Birds - - - 420 

XXIV. Mammalians - 441 

XXV. Man - - - 464 

Conclusion ------ 468 

Appendix -----. 469 

Notes and Illustrations - - - . 477 



EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 

PLATE I. 

Infusories. 

Fig. 1. a, Enchelis Pupa - ' " ? 82 

6. Alimentary canal and stomach - - \ 

2. Eosphora Naias - - • - - 84 

3. a. b. c. d. Rotifera vulgaris - - - . 82 

4. Bacillaria multipunctata - _ . 469 

5. Cleopatra - - - - 469 

6. Discocephalus Rotator - - - 469, 241 

PLATE L B. 

Infusories. 

Fig. 1. Vorticella cothurnata - • - - 470 

2. a. b. Zoobotryon pellucidum - - - 470 

Worms. 

3. Botryocephalus bicolor - - - 175 

4. Diplozoon paradoxum - - - - 473 

a. Ditto, natural size. 

b. b. Mouths and oral suckers. 

c. c. Caudal plates and suckers. 

5. Diplostomum volvens - . _ 177 

6. Eye of a perch infested by Diplo stoma. 



XIV 



EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 



PLATE II. 



Polypes. 

Fig. 1. 3fadrepora muricata 

2. tSertularia volubilis 
a. a. Ovaries. 

3. Cellaria cirrata 

4. a. Fungia patellaris, under side. 
h. Ditto, upper side. 



96 
90 

90 



PLATE III. 



Radiaries. 

Fig. L Cephea mosaica _ - - 

a. a. Arms of ditto. 

2. Echinus esculentus, portion of the shell 

shown externally. 

a. a. a. Groves. 

b. b. Alleys. 

c. c. The lateral groves. 

d. The intermediate one. 

3. Inside of the same shell. 

a. a. The dentated suture. 

b. The middle ridge marked out on each 
side into transverse pieces. 

c. c. The alleys, with pores for the suckers. 

d. One of the frames to which the jaws 
are fixed. 

4. Spines of Echinus cidaris. 

a. Muscular fibres inserted in the base of 
the spine, and surrounding the ball and 
socket joint. 

b. The muscular capsule laid open, and the 
muscles attached to the base of the spine 
turned back. 

c. Tiie origins of tlie muscles surrounding 
the ball or tubercle. 

d. One of the tubercles. 



106 



>109— 112 



EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 



XV 



Fig. 5. One of the suckers of E. escidentus. 

a. The sucker ; the pore in the centre is 
supposed to be a spiracle connected 
with the respiration of the animal. . 

b. The stalk of the sucker. )>109— -112 
6. The suture of a portion of the alleys at the 

lateral grove, in which tlie transverse 
pieces are convex. 
Fig. 7. The suture of a portion of the lateral grove^ 
uniting with the above, in which the 
transverse pieces are concave. 

8. Suture ofthe intermediate grove divided at 

the ridge (Fig. 3.6.). Teeth obtusan- 
gular. 

9. A circular space round the mouth, covered 

with little oblong scales. In the cen- 
tre is the mouth with its five converg- 
ing teeth. 

10. Outside of one of the five pyramidal jaws, 

in which the teeth are planted, ^111 — 113 

a. The jaw. b. The tooth. 

11. Inside of ditto: a, the jaw, consisting in- 

ternally of two triangular transversely 
furrowed, and probably molary plates. 

12. A little bristle, terminating in a knob with 

three awns, planted amongst the spines 
on the shell, and, according to Cuvier,* 
a species of Polype (Pedicellaria). 

13. Another Pedicellaria? expanded like a 

tripetalous blossom. 

14. One of the spines of Echinus esculentus.^ 



PLATE III. B. 

Crinoideans. 

Fig. 1. Fentacrinus Asteria - - - - 195 

2. Portion of ditto, exhibiting the suckers on the under 

side of the fingers - - - - 195 



1 Regn. An, lii. 297, 



XVI EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 



PLATE IV. 

Tunicaries. 

Fig. 1. Cinthia Momus - - - - - 123 

2. Salpa cyanogastra - - - - 120 

3. Pyrysoma giganteum - - - - 121 

4. Cephalitis Bowdichii - - - 119 

5. Clavellina borealis . . . . 123 



PLATE V. 

Bivalve Mollusc ans. 

Fig. 1. Solen Siliqua . - . . 130 

a. The foot. b. The shell. 

N.B. The two figures in outline show varia- 
tions in shapes assumed by the foot, under differ- 
ent circumstances. 

2. dnomia Cepa - - - . . 141 
a. The tendon, b. The aperture of the t/p^er valve 

through which it passes. 

3. Anomia Ephippium. 
a. Aperture. 

4. Terebratula - - - - 141 
a. Aperture of the lower valve through which the 

tendon passes. 
6 Trigonia margaritacea - - - _ 142 

a. Foot formed for leaping. 

b. b. b. Valves of the shell. 



Pteropod and Heteropod Molluscans. 



6. Cliodites fusiformis - - - - "| 

7 Polycera capensis _ . - ^ 

8. Fterotrachea rufa - - . . J 



144 
162 



EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. XVll 



PLATE VI. 



Univalve Mollusc ans. 

Fig. 1. Valuta 8ethiopica, to show the animal - - 152 

a. The eye, showing iris and pupil. 

b. The right hand tentacle. 

c. The proboscis exserted. 

d. The frontal margin of the head. 

e. The respiratory tube or siphuncle. 

f. Appendage at its base. Analogous to the crus in- 

fandihnliin Nautilus 1^ Owen. 
g. g. The two gills, of which the right hand one 

has but one series of lamina. 
h. Termination of the alimentary canal. 
i. i. The right hand margin of the mantle. 
k. The male organ. 
/. /. The foot. 
2. lanthina - - - - - 157 

a. The mouth, composed of two vertical cartilagin- 
ous lips, minutely toothed at the margin. 

b. The shell. 

c. The air-vesicles forming an out-rigger. 



PLATE VIL 

Cephalopods. 

Fig. 1. Loligo cardioptera. 

2. Spirulea prototypus - - - - 170 
a. The shell. 

3. Ocypus unguiculatus.^ - - - 165 

a. The suckers. 

b. The arms. 



1 Owen's Mem. on Naut. Pompil. t. v. h. 

2 Referred to by mistake as an Octopus, 165. 

3* 



XVlll EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 



PLATE VIII. 

Annelidans. 

Fig. 1. Peripatus Juliformis - . - - 187 

2. Anterior extremity of do. 

a. Mouth. 

b. b. Eyes. 

c. c. First pair of legs. 

3. Bdella nilotica - - - - 181 
fl. Anterior sucker. 

^^ b. Posterior do. 

c. Reproductive organs. 

4. Lycoris aegyptia - - - - 187 



PLATE IX. 

Entomostracans. 

Fig. 1 — 5. States of Adheres Percarum - - 201 

1. Foetus in Egg. 

2. further developed. 

3. Larve. 

4. Pupe? 

a. Antennae. 

6. Unguiculate thoracic legs. 

c. Natatory, sub-abdominal ditto. 

d, e. Cast skin. 

5. Imago. 

a. a. Maxillary legs. 

b. b. Antennae. 

c. c. Two posterior pair of thoracic legs confluent, so as to 
form one organ, and to each of which the sucker [d) is 
hooked, by which the animal fixes itself immovably. 

6. Abdomen, showing the eggs in the ovaries. 
/•/• Egg pouches. 
5. a. Natural size of the animal. 



EXPLANATION ON THE PLATKi. liX 



PLATE X. 



Crustaceans. 

Fig. 1. Birgus Latro - - - - - 214 

2. Fagurus clibanarius - - - - 213 

a. a. a. Adhesive organs at the tail. 

b. b. c, c. Two last pairs of thoracic legs, by which 
it also adheres to the shell it inhabits. 

d, d. Egg bearers. 

c. e. Forceps, in this species both of the same size. 

3. Phyllosoma brevicorne - - - - 220 



PLATE XL 

Arachnid AN and Insect Condylopes. 

Fig. L Mormolyce phyllodes * - - - 379 

2. Aranea notacantha - - = . 347 

3. Portion of an honey-comb, to show that every cell 
stands, as it were, upon three « - 367 



PLATE XL B. 

Arachnidan Condylopes. 

Fig 1. Ctenizafodiens - - - - - 341 

2. Nest and tube of do. 

a. Lid or trap-door. b. Tube, 

3. Cteniza nidulans - - - . 343 

4. Nest of do. 

a. Trap-door. b. Tube. 



PLATE XL C. 

Insect Condylopes. ' 

Fig. 1—3. Myrmica Kxrbii - - - - 368 

4. Nest of do. ----- 369 



XVlll EXPLANATION OF THE PLATE*. 



PLATE VIII. 

Annelidans. 

Fig. 1. Peripatus Juliformis - - - - 187 

2. Anterior extremity of do. 

a. Mouth. 

b. b. Eyes. 

c. c. First pair of legs. 

3. Bdella nilotica - - - - 181 
«. Anterior sucker. 

p^ b. Posterior do. 

c. Reproductive organs. 

4. Lycoris aegyptia - - - - 187 



PLATE IX. 

Entomostracans. 

Fig. 1 — 5. States of Actheres Percarum - - 201 

1. Fostus in Egg. 

2. further developed. 

3. Larve. 

4. Pupe? 

a. Antennae. 

b. Unguiculate thoracic legs. 

c. Natatory, sub-abdominal ditto. 

d. e. Cast skin. 

5. Imago. 

a. a. Maxillary legs. 

b. b. Antennae. 

c. c. Two posterior pair of thoracic legs confluent, so as to 
form one organ, and to each of which the sucker {d) is 
hooked, by which the animal fixes itself immovably. 

c. Abdomen, showing the eggs in the ovaries. 
/•/• Egg pouches. 
5. a. Natural size of the animal. 



EXPLANATION ON THE PLATES. XIX 



PLATE X. 

Crustaceans. 

Fig. 1. Birgus Latro - - - - - 214 

2. Fagurus clibanarius - - - - 212 

a, a. a. Adhesive organs at the tail. 

b, b, c. c. Two last pairs of thoracic legs, by which 
it also adheres to the shell it inhabits. 

d, d. Egg bearers. 

c, e. Forceps, in this species both of the same size. 

3. Phyllosoma brevicorne - - . - 220 



PLATE XL 

Arachnid AN and Insect Condylopes. 

Fig. 1. Mormolyce phyllodes ' - - - 379 

2. Aranea notacantha . - - . 347 

3. Portion of an honey-comb, to show that every cell 
stands, as it were, upon three « - 367 



PLATE XL B, 

Arachnidan Condylopes. 

Fig 1. Ctenizafodiens - - - - - 341 

2. Nest and tube of do, 

a. Lid or trap-door, b. Tube, 

3. Cteniza nidulans - - - . 343 

4. Nest of do. 

a. Trap-door. b. Tube. 



PLATE XL C. 



Insect Condylopes. 



FiQ. 1—3. Myrmica Kirbii - - - - 368 

4. Neat of do. ----- 369 



XX EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 



PLATE XII. 

Fishes. 

Fig. 1. Callicthys ----- 265 

2. Pectoral bony ray of a Silurus, found in digging at 

Blakenham parva Rectory, in Suffolk - - 263 



PLATE XIII. 

Fishes (continued). 

Fig. 1. Malthe Vespertilio - - - 262 

2. Lateral view of the head of do. 

3. A species oijishingfrog from China - - 262 

PLATE XIV. 

Reptiles. 

Fig. 1. Proteus anguinus, - - - -19, 411 

a. Gills. 

2. Anterior leg of the Chamseleon 

3. Posterior do. - 



291 



PLATE XV. 

Birds. 

Fig. 1. Sylvia cisticola - - - . 437 

2. Nest of do. 

3. Portion of do. to show the stitching of the leaves. 

PLATE XVI. 

Quadrupeds. 
Chlamyphorits truncatus . - . . o98 



INTRODUCTION. 



/ 



The Works of God and the Word of God may be called the 
two doors which open into the temple of Truth ; and, as both 
proceed from the same Almighty and Omniscient Author, they 
cannot, if rightly interpreted, contradict each other, but must 
mutually illustrate and confirm, "though each in diflferent sort 
and manner," the same truths. Doubtless it was with this 
conviction upon his mind, that the learned Professor,^ from 
whom I have borrowed my motto, expresses his opinion— that 
in order rightly to understand the voice of God in nature, we 
ought to enter her temple with the Bible in our hands. 

The prescribed object of the several treatises, of which the 
present forms one, is the illustration of the Power, Wisdom, 
and Goodness of the Deity, as manifested in the Works of 
Creation ; but it is not only directed that these primary attri- 
butes should be proved by all reasonable arguments derived 
from physical objects, but also by discoveries ancient and 
modern, and the whole extent of literature. As the Holy Scrip- 
tures form the most interesting portion, in every respect, of 
ancient literature; and it has alw^ays been the habit of the 
author of the present treatise to unite the study of the word of 
God with that of his works f he trusts he shall not be deemed 
to have stepped out of the record, where he has copiously 



1 The pious Heinrich Moritz Gaede, Professor of Natural History in the 
University of Liege. 

2 See Monographia Jipum, Anglia, i. 2, and Introd. to Ent. i. Pref. xiii. &c. 



XXll INTRODUCTION. 

drawn from the sacred fountains, provided the main tenor of 
his argument is in accordance with the brief put into his 
hands. 

Those who are disposed to unite the study of Scripture with 
that of nature, should always bear in mind the caution before 
alluded to, that all depends upon the right interpretation, either 
of the ivritten word or created substance. They who study the 
word of God, and they who study his works, are equally liable 
to^error; nor will talents, even of the highest order, always 
secure a man from falling into it. The love of truth, and of 
its Almighty Author, is the only sure guide that will conduct 
the aspirant to its purest fountains. High intellectual powers 
are a glorious gift of God, which, when associated with the 
qualities just named, lead to results as glorious, and to the 
light of real unsophisticated knowledge. But knowledge puffeih 
up, and if it stands alone, there is great danger of its leading 
its possessor into a kind of self- worship, and from thence to 
self-delusion, and the love of hypothesis. 
' It is much to be lamented that many bright lights in science, 
some from leaning too much to their own understanding, and 
others, probably from having Religion shown to them, not 
with her own winning features, nor in her own simple dress, 
but with a distorted aspect, and decked meretriciously, so that 
slie appears what she is not, without further inquiry and with- 
out consulting her genuine records, have rejected her and 
fallen into grievous errors. To them might be applied our 
Saviour's words. Ye do err not knowing the Smptures. These 
observations apply particularly to two of the most eminent 
philosophers of the present age, one for the depth of his know- 
ledge in aslronomy and general physics ; and the other in zoo- 
logy. It will be easily seen that I allude to La Place and 
Lamtirck, both of whom, from their disregard of the word of 
God, and from seeking loo exclusively their own glory, have 
fallen into errors of no sMuall magnitude. It is singular, «nd 



INTRODUCTION. XXUl 

worthy of observation, that both have based their hypothesis 
upon a similar foundation. La Place says, "An attentive in- 
spection of the solar system evinces the necessity of some cen- 
tral paramount force, in order to maintain the entire system 
together, and secure the regularity of its motions."^ One 
would expect from these remarks, that he was about to enforce 
the necessity of acknowledging the necessary existence of an 
intelligent paramount central Being, whose goings forth were 
co-extensive with the universe of systems, to create them at 
first, and then maintain their several motions and revolutions, 
so as to prevent them from becoming eccentric and interfering 
with each other,^ thus — Upholding all things by the word of his 
power. But no— -when he asks the question. What is the 
primitive cause V instead of answering it immediately, he refers 
the reader for his hypothesis to a concluding note, in which 
we find that this primitive cause, instead of the Deity, is a ne- 
bulosity originally so diffuse, that its existence can with difii- 
culty be conceived.* To produce a system like ours, one of 
these wandering masses of nebulous matter distributed through 
the immensity of the heavens,^ is converted into a brilliant 
nucleus, with an atmosphere originally extending beyond the 
orbits of all its planets, and then gradually contracting itself, 
but at its successive limits leaving zones of vapours, which, 
by their condensation, formed the several planets and their 
satellites, including the rings of Saturn !!" 

It is grievous to see talents of the very highest order, and to 
which Natural Philosophy, in other respects, is so deeply in- 
debted, forsaking the Ens Entium, the God of Gods, and ascrib- 
ing the creation of the universe of worlds to a cause which, ac- 
cording to his own confession, is all but a non-entity. He speaks, 

1 System of the World, E. Tr. ii. 330. 

2 Ibid. Appendix, concluding note. 

3 System of the World, E. Tr. ii. 328. 4 Ibid. 357. 
5 Ibid. 332. 6 Ibid. 358. 



XXIV INTRODUCTION. 

indeed, of a Supreme Intelligence, but it is as Newton's god, — 
wiiom he blames for attributing the admirable arrangement of 
the sun, of the planets, and of the comets, to an Intelligent and 
Almighty Being, ^ — and of an Author of Nature, not, however, 
as the preserver and upholder of the universe,'' but as perpetu- 
ally receding, according as the boundaries of our knowledge 
are extended f thus expelling, as it were, the Deity from all 
care or concern about his own world. 

While the philosopher thus became vain in his imaginations, 
the naturalist attempted to account for the production of all 
the various forms and structures of plants and animals upon 
similar principles. Lamarck, distinguished by the variety of 
his talents and attainments, by the acuteness of his intellect, 
by the clearness of his conceptions, and remarkable for his inti- 
mate acquaintance with his subject, thus expresses his opinion 
as to the origin of the present system of organized beings. 
'' We know, by observation, that the most simple organizations, 
whether vegetable or animal, are never met with but in minute 
gelatinous bodies, very supple and delicate ; in a word, only in 
frail bodies almost without consistence and mostly transparent." 
These minute bodies he supposes nature forms, in the waters, 
by the power of attraction ; and that next, subtle and expan- 
sive fluids, such as caloric and electricity, penetrate these 
bodies, and enlarge the interstices of their agglutinated mole- 
cules, so as to form utricular cavities, and so produce irritability 
and life, followed by a power of absorption, by which they de- 
rive nutriment from without.* 

The production of a new organ in one of these, so formed, 
animal bodies, he ascribes to a new loant, which continues to 
stimulate ; and of a new movement which that want produces 
and cherishes.* He next relates how this can be elTected. 



1 System of the World, E. Tr. ii. 331. 2 Ibid. 332. 

3 Ihid. 333. 4 .hum. san$ I'ertebr. i. 174. 

5 Ibid. 18J. 



INTRODUCTION. XXV^ 

Body, he observes, bein£^ essentially constituted of cellular 
tissue, this tissue is in sonie sort the uuiirix, from tiie modifica- 
tion of which by the fluids put in motion by the stimulus of 
desire, membranes, fibres, vascular canals, and divers organs, 
gradually appear ; parts are strengthened and solidified;^ and 
thus progressively new parts and organs are formed, and more 
and more perfect organizations produced ; and thus, by conse- 
quence, in the lapse of ages a monad becomes a man! !! 

The great object both of La Place and Lamarck seepis to be 
to ascribe all the works of creation to second causes ; and to 
account for the production of all the visible universe, and the 
furniture of our own globe, without the intervention of o. first. 
Both begin the work by introducing nebulosities or masses of 
matter scarcely amounting to real entities, and proceed as if 
they had agreed together upon the modus operandi. 

As Lamarck's hypothesis relates particularly to the animal 
kingdom, I shall make a few observations upon it, calculated 
to prove its utter irrationality. 

When, indeed, one reads the above account of the mode by 
which, according to our author's hypothesis, the first vegetable 
and animal forms were produced, we can scarcely help think- 
ing that we have before us a receipt for making the organized 
beings at the foot of the scale in either class — a mass of irri- 
table matter formed by attraction, and a repulsive principle to 
introduce into it and form a cellular tissue, are the only ingre- 
dients necessary. Mix them, and you have an animal which 
begins to absorb fluid, and move about as a monad or a vibrio, 
multiplies itself by scissions or germs, one of which being 
stimulated by a want to take its food by a mouth, its fluids 
move obediently towards its anterior extremity, and in time a 
mouth is obtained ; in another generation, a more talented 
individual discovering that one or more stomachs and other 

1 Anim. sans Vertlhr. i. 184. 

4* * 



XXVI INTRODUCTION. 

intestines would be a convenient addition to a mouth, the fluids 
immediately take a contrary direction, and at length this wish 
is accomplished ; next a nervous collar round the gullet is 
acquired, and this centre of sensation being gained, the usual 
organs of the senses of course follow. But enough of this. 

Let any one examine the whole organization and structure, 
both internal and external, of any animal, and he will find that 
it forms a whole, in which the different organs and members 
have a mutual relation and dependence, and that if one is sup- 
posed to be abstracted, the whole is put out of order and can- 
not fulfil its evident functions. If we select, as a well known 
instance, the Hive-bee for an example. Its long tongue is es- 
pecially formed to collect honey ; its honey stomach to receive 
and elaborate it either for regurgitation, or for the formation of 
wax ; and other organs or pores are added, by which the latter 
can be transmitted to the wax pockets under its abdomen ; 
connected with these, are its means and instruments to build 
its cells, either for store cells to contain its honey and bee-bread, 
or its young brood, such as the form of its jaws, and the struc- 
ture and furniture of its hind legs. Now here are a number 
of organs and parts that must have been contemporary, since 
one is evidently constructed with a view to the other : and the 
whole organization and structure of the whole body forming 
the societies of these wonder-working beings, that I mean, of 
the males, females, and workers, is so nicely adjusted, as to 
concur exactly in producing the end that an intelligent Creator 
intended, and directing each to that function and ofl[ice which 
he devolved upon them, and to exercise which he adapted 
them. Were we to go through the whole animal kingdom the 
same mutual relation and dependence between the different 
parts and organs of the structure and their functions would be 
found. 

Can any one in his rational senses believe for a moment that 
all these adaptations of one organ to another, and of the whole 



INTRODUCTION. XXVll 

Structure to a particular function, resulted originally from the 
wants of a senseless animal living by absorption, and whose 
body consisted merely of cellular tissue, which in the lapse of 
ages, and in an infinity of successive generations by the mo- 
tions of its fluids, directed here and there, produced this beauti- 
ful and harmonious system of organs all subservient to one 
purpose ; and which in numerous instances vary their functions 
and organs, but still preserving their mutual dependence, by 
passing through three different states of existence. 

Lamarck's great error, and that of many others of his com- 
patriots, is materialism; beseems to have no faith in any thing 
but body, attributing every thing to a physical, and scarcely 
any thing to a metaphysical cause. Even when, in words, he 
admits the being of a God, he employs the whole strength of 
his intellect to prove that he had nothing to do with the works 
of creation. Thus he excludes the Deity from the government 
of the world that he has created, putting nature in his place ; 
and with respect to the noblest and last formed of his creatures 
into whom he himself breathed the breath of life; he cer- 
tainly admits him to be the most perfect of animals, but instead 
of a son of God, the root of his genealogical tree, according to 
him, is an animalcule, a creature without sense or voluntary 
motion, or internal or external organs, at least in his idea—no 
wonder therefore that he considers his intellectual powers, not 
as indicating a spiritual substance derived from heaven though 
resident in his body, but merely as the result of his organiza- 
tion,* and ascribes to him in the place of a soul, a certain 
interior sentiment, upon the discovery of which he prides him- 
self.* In one of his latest descriptions of it, he thus describes 
the office of this internal sentiment : " Every action of an 
intelligent individual, whether it be a movement or a thought, 

1 JV*. Diet. D'Hist. Nat. xvi. Artie. Intelligence, 344. comp. Ibid. Artie. 
Jdee, 78, 80. 

2 Ibid. 332. 



XXVlll INTRODUCTION. 

or an act amongst the thoughts, is necessarily preceded by a 
want of that which has power to excite such action. This 
want felt immediately moves the internal sentiment, and iq 
the same instant, that sentiment directs the disposable portion of 
the nervous fluid, either upon the muscles of that part of the 
body which is to act, or upon the part of the organ of intelli- 
gence, where are impressed the ideas which should be rendered 
present to the mind, for the execution of the intellectual act 
which the want demands."i In fact Lamarck sees nothing in 
the universe but bodies, whence he confounds sensation with 
intellect. Our eyes certainly show us nothing but bodies — 
their actions and motions, their structure, their form and colour; 
our ears the sounds they produce ; our touch their degree of 
resistance, or comparative softness or hardness ; our smell their 
scent; our taste their flavour ; but though our senses can con- 
duct us no further, we find a very active substance in full 
power within us that can. At a very early period of life we 
feel a wish to know something further concerning the objects 
to which our senses introduce us, which often generates a 
restless desire in the mind to gain information concerning the 
causes and origin of those things perceived by them ; now this 
is the result of thought, and thought is no body, and though 
the thinking essence inhabits a body, yet we cannot help feeling 
that our thoughts are an attribute of an immaterial substance. 
Thought, discursive and excursive thought, that is not confined 
to the contemplation of the things of earth, things that are 
immediately about us, but can elevate itself to heaven, and the 
heavenly bodies, not only to those of our own system, but can 
take flights beyond the bounds of time and space, and enter 
into the Holy of Holies, and contemplate Him who sitteth upon 
the cherubim, the throne of his Deity. Thought, that not only 
beholds things present, however distant and removed from 

1 JV. DiU. D'JIist. Aal. xvi. Artie. Jntclligcitce, 350. 



INTRODUCTION. XXIX 

sense, but can contemplate the days of old and the years of 
many generations, can cany us back to hail with the angelic 
choirs, the birth-day of nature and of the world that we in- 
habit ; or looking into the abyss of futurity, can anticipate the 
termination of our present mixed scene — chequered with light 
and darkness, good and evil — and the beginning of that eternal 
sabbath which remaineth for the people of God in the heavenly 
kingdom of Christ : thought that can not only take these 
flights, and exercise herself in these heavenly musings ; but 
accompanied as she is, in our favoured race, with the gift of 
speech can reason upon them with a fellow mind, and by such 
discussion often elicit sparks of truth, that may be useful to 
enhghten mankind. Who can believe that such a faculty, so 
divine and god-like and spiritual, can be the mere result of 
organization ? That any juxta-position of material molecules, 
of whatever nature, from whatever source derived, in whatever 
order and form arranged, and wherever placed, could generate 
thought, and reflection, and reasoning powers ; could acquire 
and store up ideas and notions as well concerning metaphysical 
as physical essences may as safely be pronounced impossible, 
as that matter and spirit should be homogeneous. Though 
the intellectual part acts by the brain and nerves, yet the brain 
and nerves, however ample, however developed, are not the 
intellect, nor an intellectual substance, but only its instrument, 
fitted for the passage of the prime messenger of the soul, the 
nervous fluid or power, to every motive organ. It is a sub- 
stance calculated to convey instantaneously that subtile agent, 
by which spirit can act upon body, wherever the soul bids it to 
go and enables it to act. When death separates the intellec- 
tual and spiritual from the material part, the introduction of a 
fluid homogeneous with the nervous, or related to it by a gal- 
vanic battery can put the nerves in action, lift the eye-lids, 
move the limbs, but though the action of the intellectual part 
may thus be imitated, in newly deceased persons, still there 



XXX INTRODUCTION. 

are no signs of returning intelligence ; there is no life, no vol- 
untary action, not a trace of the spiritual agent that has been 
summoned from its dwelling. Whence it follows, that though 
the organization is that by which the intellectual and govern- 
ing power manifests its presence and inhabitation, still it is 
evidently something distinct from and independent of it. 

Mr Lyell has so fully considered that part of Lamarck's hy- 
pothesis which relates particularly to the transmutation of spe- 
cies, and so satisfactorily proved their general stability, that it 
is unnecessary for me to enter more particularly into that sub- 
ject, I must therefore refer the reader to that portion of his 
work.* 

Let us lastly enquire, to whom or what, according to our 
author, God has given up the reins ; whom he has appointed 
his viceroy in the government of the universe. J^ature is the 
second power who sits on this viceregal throne, governing the 
physical universe, whom we should expect to be superior in 
intellect and power to angel and archangel — but no — he 
defines her to be — "An order of things composed of objects in- 
dependent of matter, which are determined by the observation 
of bodies, and the whole amount of which constitutes a power 
unalterable in its essence, governed in all its acts, and con- 
stantly acting upon all parts of the physical universe."* And 
again. Nature he affirms consists of non-physical objects, which 
are neither beings, nor bodies, nor matter. It is composed of 
motion ; of laws of every description ; and has perpetually at 
its disposal space and time.'* 

With respect to the agency of this vicegerent of Deity, he 
-observes that Nature is a blind power without intelligence 
which acts necessarily.* That matter is her sole domain, of 
which however she can neither create nor destroy a single 

1 Principles of Geology, ii. c. 1, 2. 

2 JV. Diet. D'Hist. JVat. xxii. Art. J^aturey 377. 

3 JHd. 4 Ibid.dSi. 



INTRODUCTION. XXXI 

atom, though she modifies it continually in every way and 
under every form, — and causes the existence of all bodies of 
which matter is essentially the base ; — and that in our globe 
it is she that has immediately given existence to vegetables, 
to animals, as well as to other bodies that are there to be met 
with/ 

From these statements, though he appears to admit the ex- 
istence of a Deity, and that he is the primary author of all 
things, yet he considers him as having delegated his power to 
nature as his vicegerent, to whose disposal he has left all ma- 
terial subsistences, and who, according to him, is the real crea- 
tor of all the forms and beings that exist, and who maintains 
the physical universe in its present state. It is not quite clear 
what opinion he held with respect to the creation of matter, 
as he no where expressly ascribes it to God ; though, since he 
excludes nature from it, we may infer, unless he thought it to 
be eternal, that be meant it should be ascribed to the Deity ; 
but, if such was his opinion, he ought to have stated it dis- 
tinctly and broadly ; which he certainly would have done had 
he felt any anxiety to prevent misrepresentation. As it is, his 
God is an exact counterpart of the God of Epicurus, who leav- 
ing all to nature or chance, takes no further care or thought 
for the worlds to which he had given being. 

But what is this mighty and next to omnipotent power, 

This great-grandmother of all creatures bred, 
Great Nature ever young, but full of eld; 
Still moving, yet immoved from her sted ; 
Unseen of any, yet of all beheld ; 
Thus sitting in her throne 

as quaintly sings our great bard of allegory.* 

Now this great-grandmother of the whole creation, who„ 



1 JV*. Diet. D'Hist. Nat. xxii. Art. Nature^ 369, 376. 
9 Faerie Queene, B. vii, c. vii. st. 13. 



XXXll INTRODUCTION. 

according to our auilior, takes all trouble off the hands of the 
God of Gods, sitting as it were in his throne, and directing 
and upholding all things by the word of her power, — what is 
she? Is she not at least a secondary spirit, co-extensive with 
the physical universe which she forms, and the limits of which 
alone terminate her action ? This the various and wonderful 
operations attributed to her by this her worshipper would pro- 
claim her to be. How then are we surprised and astonished 
when studying and w^eighing every scruple of his definitions 
of this his great Diana of Ephesus, and casting them up, we 
find at the foot of the account that she literally amounts to 
NOTHING. That she is a compound of attributes without any 
subsistence to hang them upon. His primary character of her, 
on which he insists in every part of his works, declares her to 
be an Order of Things. What idea does this phrase convey to 
the mind? That of things arranged and acting in a certain 
order. But no — this is not his meaning. She is an order of 
things composed of objects independent of matter. These- ob- 
jects are all metaphysical, and are neither beings, nor bodies, 
nor matter. But if she is not a being, she can have no exist- 
ence. Yes, says our author, she is composed of motion. But 
what is motion considered abstractedly, without reference 
to the mover or the moved ] Like its negative rest, it is 
nothing. He, Whose goings forth have been from of old, from 
everlasting, is the First Mover, and the motion which he 
hath generated in his physical universe, was communicated 
by Him to existences, which he had created and formed lo 
execute his will, and by thtm to others, and so propagated, 
as it were, from hand to hand, according to his laws, till the 
universe was in motion generally, and in all its systems and 
their several members. The Deity, at once (he centre and 
circumference of creation, going forth incessantly, all the sys- 
tems that form the physical universe, severally concatenated 
into one great system, responding to his aclion, and revolving 



INTRODUCTION. XXXUl 

round and contained in that central and circumferential foun- 
tain of ever-flowing light and glory,* that Spiritual Sun of the 
whole universe of systems, of which every sun of every system 
is a type and symbol. To Him be ascribed the Glory, and the 
Power, and the Kingdom, in scBCula scBCulorum, Amen. 

Another object which Lamarck considers as constituting na- 
ture, is LaiD. But law considered abstractedly is also nothing. 
It may exist in the Divine counsels, but till it is promulgated, 
and powers appointed and empowered who can enforce it; as 
likewise other objects brought into existence upon which it can 
act, or that can obey it ; it is a word without power or effect. 
As in order to motion there must be a mover and something 
to be moved, so in order to a potential law, as well as a pro- 
mulgator, there must be a being to enforce it and another to 
obey it. 

With regard to hia third ingredient, space and time, the thea- 
tre and limit of Nature's operations; they give her no subsist- 
ence, she still remains a nonentity; therefore, as defined by our 
author, she is nothing, and can do nothing. 

But although nature, as defined by Lamarck, consists merely 
of abstract quahties, independent of any essence or being, and 
therefore can neither form any thing, nor operate upon what 
is already formed ; yet would I by no means be understood as 
contending that there are no inter-agents between God and the 
visible material world by which he acts upon it, and as it were 
takes hold of it ; by which he has commenced and still main- 
tains motion in it and its parts ; causing it to observe certain 
general and local laws ; and upholds, in the whole and every 
part, those several powers and operations that have been thus 
produced ; that action and counteraction every where observa- 
ble, by which all things are maintained in their places ; observe 



1 Deus omnium capax, Herm. Pastor, 1. ii. Mand. 1. Iren. Mv. Hares. 
ii. c. 55. 

5* 



XXXIV INTRODUCTION. 

their regular motions and revolutions; and exhibit all those 
phenomena that are produced under certain circumstances. 
Whatever names philosophers have used to designate such 
powers, they have a real substance and being, and are a some- 
thing that can act and operate, and impart a momentum. 

Lord Verulam's two hands of nature, whereby she chiefly 
worketh,* heat and cold, synonymous, according to some, with 
positive and negative electricity;^ the plastic nature of Cud- 
worth, and some of the ancients ; the spirit of nature of Dr Henry 
More;^ and the ether of Sir Isaac Newton, all seem to express 
or imply an agency between the Deity and the visible world, 
directed by him. Attraction and repulsion; centripetal and cen- 
trifugal forces, or universal gravitation, all imply a power or 
powers in action, that are something more than names and 
nonentities, that are moving in two directions, and consist of 
antagonist forces. 

If we consult Holy Scripture with the view of ascertaining 
whether any or what terms are therein employed to express the 
same powers, we shall find that generally speaking, the word 
heaven, or the heavens, and symbolically the cherubim, are 
used for that purpose. But upon this subject, which has con- 
siderable bearing upon the doctrine of instinct, I shall enlarge 
in a subsequent part of this introduction. 

Having stated Lamarck's hypothesis with respect to nature, 
the Goddess which he worshipped, and which he decked with 
divine attributes and divine power, I shall, as briefly as possible, 
give some account of his theory of life. Life indeed is a sub- 
ject that hath puzzled, doth puzzle, and will puzzle philoso- 
phers and physiologists, probably till time shall be no more. 
Thus much, however, may be predicated of it, that both in the 
vegetable and animal, like heat, it is a radiant principle, show- 

1 Bacon's Works, iii. JVat. Hist. Cent. i. p. CO. 

2 See Lit. Gaz. Jamiury 7, 1635, p. 43. 

3 See above, p. 323. 



INTRODUCTION. XXXV 

ing itself by successive developments for a limited period, 
varying according to the species, when it begins to decline and 
finally is extinguished : that sometimes also, like heat, as in 
the seed of the vegetable and egg of the animal, it is latent, 
not manifesting itself by development, till it is submitted to 
the action of imponderable fluids, conveyed by moisture or 
incubation. 

But to return to our author. "We have seen," says he, 
"that the life which we remark in certain bodies, in some sort 
resembled nature, insomuch that it is not a being, but an order 
of things animated by movements ; which has also its power, 
its faculties, and which exercises them necessarily while it 
exists.* He also ascribes these vital movements to an existing 
cause. Speaking of the imponderable incoercible fluids, and 
specifying heat, electricity, the magnetic fluid, &:c. to which 
he is inclined to add hght, he says, it is certain that without 
them, or certain of them, the phenomenon of life could not be 
produced in any body." Now, though heat, electricity, &c. 
are necessary to put the principle of life in motion, they evi- 
dently do not impart it. The seed of a vegetable, or the egg 
of a bird have each of them, if I may so speak, eipunctum saliens, 
a radiating principle, which, under certain circumstances, they 
can retain in a latent state, for a considerable time ; but if once 
that principle is extinct, no application of heat, or electricity, 
under any form, can revive it, so as to commence any devel- 
opment of the germ it animated. Experiments have been 
made upon human bodies ; and those of other animals, which, 
by the application of galvanism, after death, have exhibited 
various muscular movements, such as hfiing the eye-lids, mov- 
ing the arms and legs, &c. but though motions usually pro- 
duced by the will acting by the nerves upon the muscles have 
thus been generated by a species of the electric fluid, proving 

1 Mini, sans Vertlhr. i. 331. - 2 Ihid. I 4S. 



XXXVi INTRODUCTION. 

its affinity with the nervous power or fluid, yet the subjects of 
the experiment, when the action was intermitted, continued 
still without life ; no return of that power or essence which 
was fled for ever, being effected by it, v/hich seems to render 
it clear that neither caloric nor electricity, though essential 
concomitants of life, form its essence. 

I trust I may render some service to the cause of truth and 
science, if I again revert to the subject which I mentioned at 
the beginning of this introduction, I mean the study of the 
word of God, together with that of his works, with the view to 
illustrate one by the other. 

The great and wonderful genius before alluded to, Lord 
Verulam, who laid the foundation upon which the proud struc- 
ture of modern philosophy is erected, who banished from science 
the visionary theories of the speculator,^ and the unfounded 
dogmas of the bigot, and made experiment, and, as it were, 
the anatomy of nature, the root of true physical knowledge ; 
warns the philosopher against making holy scripture his text 
book, for a system of philosophy, which he says, is like seeking 
the dead amongst the living.^ I am disposed, however, to 
think that this illustrious philosopher, by this observation, did 
not mean to exclude all study of the word of God, with a view 
to discover what is therein dehvered concerning physical sub- 
jects, for he himself speaks of the book of Job, as pregnant 
with the mysteries of natural philosophy;' but his object was 
to point out the evil effects of a superstitious and bigotled ad- 
herence to the letter of scripture, concerning which men w^ere 
very liable to be mistaken, and of inattention to its spirit^ which 
is averse to all persecution, so that persons of a philosophic 
mind might not be interrupted in their investigations of nature, 
by the clamours or menaces of mistaken men. 

In the dark ages, anterior to the Reformation, superstition 

1 Idola Specdts. 2 Dc Augment. Sc. I. ix. c. 1, § 3. 

3 l/iri^upr.l. ix. c.l, §47,cd. 1740. 



INTRODUCTION. XXXVU 

occupied the seat of true and rational religion. Ye do err not 
knowing the Scriptures, was an observation almost universally 
applicable. The armed hand of authority was lifted up against 
all such as endeavoured to interpret either Scripture or nature 
upon just and rational principles. Every such effort was re- 
jected, was reprobated ex cathedra, and persecuted as a danger- 
ous and pestilent heresy : thus every avenue to the discovery 
of truth, either in religion or science, was attempted to be 
closed. This evil spirit it was that proscribed the system of 
Copernicus, and, because it appeared contrary to the letter of 
Scripture, persecuted Galileo for affirming that the earth moved 
round the sun. Lord Verulam clearly saw the evil conse- 
quences that would result to the cause of true philosophy, if 
the sober study of nature, and all experimental research into 
the works of creation, were, to be denounced as impious, be- 
cause of some seeming discordance with the letter of Scripture, 
or because a narrow-minded theologian could not discern 
where the writers of the Bible adopted popular phraseology, in 
condescension to the innocent prejudices and uninformed un- 
derstandings of those to whom they addressed themselves; 
and he therefore employed all the energy of his powerful mind 
to persuade the learned theologian, that for the discovery of 
physical truth we must have recourse to induction from expe- 
riment and soberly conducted investigation of physical phe- 
nomena, while for spiritual we should seek to draw living 
waters from the fountain of life contained in Scripture. The 
Bible was not intended to make us philosophers, but to make 
us wise unto salvation. 

But it does not follow, because we are to seek for religious 
truth principally in the Bible, that we can derive none from 
the study of natural objects ; nor, on the contrary, because we 
are not to go to the Bible for a system of philosophy, that no 
philosophical truths are contained in it. The Scripture ex- 
pressly declares that the invisible things of God may be under- 



XXXVlll INTRODUCTION. 

Stood by the things that are made — and if we may have 
recourse to the works of creation as well as to revelation to lead 
us to the knowledge of the Creator, we may, on the other 
hand, by parity of reason, without meriting any reprehension, 
inquire into what God has revealed in Scripture concerning 
the physical world and its phenomena. Lord Bacon himself 
observes, that Philosophy is given to Religion as a most faith- 
ful handmaid; since Religion declares the will of God, and 
Philosophy manifests his power, — and he applies to this our 
Saviour's reproof of the Jews. Ye do err not knowing the 
Scriptures nor the power of God. That is, ye have not endea- 
voured to know him by a right mode of studying either his 
word or his works. The study of both is necessary to the right 
understanding of either — we cannot rightly understand God's 
word without a knowledge of his works, and perpetual appeal 
is made to his works in his word ; neither can we perfectly 
understand his works without the knowledge of his word. 

The penetrating mind of Bacon clearly perceived, that if 
supposed statements of Scripture were made the sole test by 
which philosophical systems were to be tried,^there was an end 
of all progress in science, no use in making experiments, or 
pursuing a course of inductive reasoning. And this was the 
temper of the age in which he lived ; light was beginning to 
spring up, and because it was novel, it was thought to be 
heretical and subversive of Scripture. But men's minds are 
now much altered in this respect, and there is no danger of 
persecution on account of heterodoxy either in religion or phi- 
losophy. In fact the tide seems turned the other way, and a 
clamour is sometimes raised against persons who consult the 
revealed word of God on points connected with philosophy and 
science. But surely if the Scriptures are, as we believe, a 
revelation from the Creator of that world concerning which we 
philosophize, and if some parts of them do contain mysteries of 
natural philosophy, as Bacon himself contends they do, some 



INTRODUCTION. XXXIX 

respect and deference are due to the word of God, and some 
allowance may be claimed by those who appeal to it on any 
point of science, even if their appeal originates in a miscon- 
ception and misinterpretation of any part of it ; the same 
allowance as is made for those, and they are many, who mis- 
interpret nature. 

In the observations here made upon some dicta of the illus- 
trious sage, who, unless we admit his venerable namesake. 
Friar Bacon, to a share in that distinction, may be termed the 
first founder of modern philosophy, I have not the most distant 
thought of detracting from the splendour of his merits, or of 
deducting any thing from the amount of the vast debt which 
science owes him ; but, as I have before observed, mankind, 
from the earliest ages, have been prone almost to idolize those 
to whom they were indebted for any weighty benefits, or to 
whom they looked up as inventors of useful arts, or masters of 
hitherto occult sciences. Gratitude, indeed, demands that 
great and original geniuses, whom God has enriched with ex- 
traordinary talents, by the due exercise of which they have 
become benefactors of the human race, should be loved and 
valued highly for their services ; but when we look only at the 
instrument, and see not the hand of Supreme Benevolence that 
employs it for our benefit, we then overvalue man and under- 
value God ; putting the former into the place of the latter, and 
making an idol of him : and if any will not worship this idol, 
a clamour is raised against them, and they are almost perse- 
cuted. Our great philosopher himself complains of this ten- 
dency to overvalue individuals as the cause and source of great 
evils to science : he considers it as a kind of fascination that 
bewitches mankind.* 

1 Rursus vero homines a progressu in scientiis detinuit, et fere incantavit 
reverentia antiquitatis, et virorum, qui in philosophia magni habiti sunt, au- 

thoritas. Itaque mirum non est, si fascina ista antiquitatis, et authorum, 

et consensus, hominum virtutem ita ligaverint, ut cum rebus ipsis consuescere 
(tanquam maleficiati) non potuerint. Nov. Organ. 1. i. aphor. 84. 



I 



Xl INTRODUCTION. 

Since the time of Bacon, philosophers and inquirers into na- 
ture have for the most strictly adhered to his rule, if such it 
may be deemed ; and, with the exception of a single sect, who 
perhaps have gone too far in an opposite direction,^ have made 
little or no inquiry as to what is delivered in Scripture on phy- 
sical subjects, or with respect to the causes of the various phe- 
nomena exhibited in our system, or in the physical universe : 
but surely it is a most interesting, as well as novel field of 
study, for the philosopher to ascertain what has really been 
revealed in Scripture on these great subjects. The opinions of 
the ancients upon this head have been investigated and can- 
vassed, and an approximation traced between them, in some 
respects, to those of modern philosophers :' if the same diligence 
was exercised upon the Scriptures, we might arrive at inform- 
ation with regard to the great powers that, under God, rule 
the physical universe, which it is hopeless to gain by the usual 
means of investigation. 

But the great difficulty lies in the interpretation of those 
passages of Scripture that relate to physical Phenomena. 
Bacon often repeats these words of Solomon, — It is the glory of 
God to conceal a thing. As Moses, when he descended from 
the mount, was obliged to veil his face, because the Israelites 
could not bear its effulgence f so the Deity was pleased to 
conceal many both spiritual and physical truths under a veil 
of figures and allegory, because the prejudices, ignorance, and 
grossness of the bulk of the people could not bear them, but 
they were written for the instruction and admonition of those 
in every age whose minds are liberated from the misrule of 
prejudice, and less darkened by the clouds of ignorance ; but 
still it requires, and always will require, much study and com- 
parison of one part of Scripture with another, to discover the 

1 The Ilutchinsonians. 

2 See Prof. Daubeny's Inlrod. to the Atomic Thcorrjf 13. ; 

3 Exod. xxxiv. 29, &c. 



INTRODUCTION. xli 

meaning of many of those passages of Scripture which relate 
to physical objects. 

The Apostle to the Hebrews observes that the manner in 
which God revealed himself to the ancient w^orld and the Jew- 
ish nation, was by dividing his communications into many 
parcels, delivered at different times ;^ and by clothing them in 
a variety of figures, and imparting them under different cir- 
cumstances,^ so that in order to get a correct notion of them it 
is necessary to compare one part of Scripture with another, and 
to weigh well the various figures under which they are con- 
cealed, and the use of them on other occasions; and also to 
consider the modes in which they were communicated to the 
mind of the prophet, whether in a vision exhibited to him when 
entranced; in a dream when asleep; or under certain acts, 
which he was commanded, or by immediate inspiration excited, 
to perform. So that if we wish to ascertain the meaning of 
any particular symbol, or of the terms in which any commu- 
nication is made from God in Holy Scripture ; we must not be 
satisfied by studying merely the passage under our eye, but, 
comparing spiritual things with spiritual, hunt out the meaning, 
as it were, by considering all those passages where the same 
thing is alluded to. 

It is to be observed, that in all the communications which it 
has pleased the Deity to make of his will to mankind, respect 
is had to the then state of society, and the progress of know- 
ledge, arts, and civilization — light was imparted to them as 
they were able to bear it ; they were fed with milk when they 
could not digest strong meat. Prejudices take usually so firm 
a hold upon the bulk of any people, that to attack them di- 
rectly, instead of opening, closes all the avenues to the heart. 
Even the most enlightened in some respects, in others are often 
under their dominion ; and, therefore, it is only by imparting 

6* 



Xlii INTRODUCTION. 

truth HcTe a little and there a little, as circumstances admit, and 
embroidering the veil, under which we are obliged to soften the 
effulgence of her light, wilh varied imagery, darkly shadowing 
out her mysteries, that a way is prepared for her final triumph 
and universal reception. She is often A light shining in a dark 
place, gradually expelling prejudice and error, and shining more 
and more unto the perfect day. 

It was not so much necessary for the conversion and reform- 
ation of mankind to make them philosophers as to make them 
believers. The great bulk of mankind were ignorant and unin- 
structed persons, whence in order to win their attention, it was 
necessary to address them in a language which they under- 
stood, and in a phraseology, with respect to physical objects, 
to which they were accustomed, and as those objects appear 
to the senses. Thus the moon is called a great hght, because 
she appears so and is so to us, though really less than the planets 
and fixed stars ; the sun is said to rise, and other parallel ex- 
pressions, which are true with respect to us, and to the appear- 
ance of the thing, though not with respect to the fact physi- 
cally considered. When the sacred writers speak of the Deity 
in terms borrowed from the human figure, as if he had hands, 
eyes, feet, and the like, and as if he was agitated by human 
passions, it is for the sake of illustrating the Divine attributes 
and proceedings by those passions, faculties, senses, and organs 
in man, by which alone we can gain any idea of what may be 
analogous to them in the Divine Nature. 

But though such condescension is shown by the Holy Spirit 
to the ignorance and imperfections of his people, by adopting, 
as it were, a phraseology founded upon their innocent errors, 
and those misapprehensions of things into which they were 
led by their senses : it is not thence to be concluded that this 
popular language pervades the whole of the Holy Word ; or 
that it is impossible, or even difficult, to distinguish things 
spoken ad captum, from statements relating to the physical 



INTRODUCTION. xHil 

constitution of nature which are to be received as spoken ex 
cathedra, and as dictated by the Holy Spirit. It should not be 
lost sight of, that the great object of Revelation was to reclaim 
mankind from the debasing worship of those that were not gods 
by nature; of those powers in nature, or their symbols, select- 
ed from natural objects, which God employed and directed as 
his agents in»the formation and government of the globe we 
inhabit, and of the whole universe, "But we," saj^s Bacon, 
"dedicate or erect no capital or pyramid to the pride of men ; 
but, in the human intellect, lay the foundations of a holy tem- 
ple, an exemplar of the ivorld.^^^ This passage is capable of an 
application that may lead us into an avenue terminating in 
such a temple, which, though not erected in the human intel- 
lect, may enlighten it in several points relating to physical 
truths concerning which it is now in darkness. The Mosaical 
tabernacle and the Solomonian temple were both erected not 
after the imaginings of the spirit of man ; but the former after 
a pattern which was shown to Moses in the mount f and the 
latter after another given by David to Solomon, which it is ex- 
pressly stated he had by the Spirit, and which Jehovah made 
him understand in writing (or commit to writing) by his hand 
upon him.^ Now, if these holy places were erected after a pat- 
tern divinely furnished, that pattern doubtless was significant, 
and intended to answer some important purpose. The great 
end which the Deity had in view by the selection of the 
Israelitish nation, was to prevent all knowledge of himself, as 
the Creator and Governor of the world, from being totally ob- 
literated from the minds of men, and to keep alive the expec- 
tation of the promised seed, who was to effect the great deliver- 
ance of mankind from the yoke and consequences of sin, and 
the dominion of Satan. Had it not been for this step, the 



1 Nov. Org. aphorism. 120. 2 Exod. xxv. 40, xxvi. 30. 

3 1 Chron. xxviii. 12, 19. 



Xliv INTRODUCTION. 

worship of those powers and intermediate agents by which 
God acts upon the earth and the world at large, and produces 
all the phenomena observable in the physical universe; of 
their symbols; or of deified men and women, would have en- 
tirely superseded the worship of their Almighty Author, and 
the whole earth would have been so covered by this palpable 
darkness, that no glimpse of light would have been left to fos- 
ter the hope and prove the germ of a future day of glory. The 
great object, therefore, of the Godhead being the assertion of 
his own supremacy, and to proclaim his own agency by the 
powers that are known to govern in nature, it was to be expect- 
ed that a tabernacle or temple erected after a pattern furnished 
by the Deity would conspicuously do this. 

But before I enter further into this mysterious subject, it will 
be proper to obviate an objection that may be alleged, viz. that 
it is incongruous and out of place to intioduce, into a work 
like the present, any inquiry into the nature and contents of 
the Jewish temple, especially the meaning of those symbolical 
images placed in the Holy of Holies and called the Cherubim, 
but when it is further considered that these symbols are rep- 
resented as winged animals with four faces, and that these 
faces are those of the kings and rulers, as it were, of the ani- 
mal kingdom]: — namely, the ox, the chief amongst cattle ; the 
lion, the king of wild beasts ; and the eagle, the ruler of the 
birds ; and lastly, Man, who has all things put under his feet, — 
there seems to be no slight connection between the cherubim 
and the animal creation. If we regard the antitypes of these 
images as exclusively metaphysical, this argument will not 
hold; but if, as I hope to prove from Scripture, they consist of 
physical, as well as metaphysical objects, by which the Deity 
acts upon the whole animal kingdom, and particularly in all 
instinctive operations, I trust I shall be justified in entering so 
fully into this interesting subject. In this inquiry I have en- 
deavoured to guide myself entirely by the word of God com- 



INTRODUCTION. xlv 

paring spiritual things with spiritual ; at the same time taking 
into consideration those arguments, where the case seemed to 
require it, that his works supply. 

The Jewish tabernacle, which, asPhilo calls it,^ was a port- 
able temple, every reader of Scripture knows was divided into 
two principal parts, or, according to the apostle to the Hebrews, 
tabernacles ; the first of which was called the Holy Place ; and 
the second, the Most Holy Place, or the Holy of Holies. This 
last tabernacle is expressly staled in Scripture to be a figure of 
heaven. " For Christ is not entered into the holy places made 
with hands f which are the figures of the true, but into Heaven itself 
now to appear in the presence of God for us.'''^^ Where allusion is 
evidently made to the annual entry of the Jewish high priest 
into the second tabernacle, as representing Christ's entry into 
heaven itseif, where the presence of God was manifested. Now 
if the second tabernacle represented the Heaven of Heavens, 
the first we may conclude, in which the ordinary service and 
worship of God were transacted, was a symbol of this world or 
our solar system.^ 

If we consider the furniture of the two tabernacles, we gain 
further instruction on the subject we are considering. In the 
first was the golden candlestick with its seven lights, the table, 
and the show-bread. Amongst the Jews, the candlestick 
seems to have been regarded as a kind of planetarium, repre- 
senting the solar system, at least those parts of it that were 
visible to the unassisted eye.^ It is worthy of remark that the 
central lamp, which appears to be four times the size of the 
rest, is stated by Philo to represent the sun. The table and the 
show-bread, in a physical sense, may perhaps be regarded as 
symbolizing the earth and its productions, the table which 



1 'Ii/)oir 4)op»Tov. De Vita Mosis, 1. iii. 

2 Heb. ix. 24. 3 'Aytov Koa-fxiKov. 

4 Joseph. Jlntiq. 1. iii. c. 7, comp. Philo. De Vita Mosis, 1. iii, 518, B. C. 
Ed. Col. All. 1613. 



Xlvi INTRODUCTION. 

God spreads and sets before us. But as well as a physical, 
these things have a metaphysical or spiritual meaning. The 
candlestick symbolizing the church and its ministers, who are 
characterized as " Lights in the world,^^^ — the churches as 
candlesticks, and the principal ministers of Christ as stars.^ 

The contents of the second Tabernacle, or Most Holy Place, 
are now to be considered ; these were an. ark or chest contain- 
ing the two tables of the decalogue, over w^hicli was placed a 
propitiatory or mercy-seat of pure gold, at each end of which, 
and forming part of the same plate, was fixed a Cherub, or 
sculptured image so called. The directions for the fabrication 
of these images are not accompanied by any description of 
them. They are spoken of as objects well known to the Jews ; 
but in the prophecy of Ezekiel, they are described as each 
having four faces and four wings ; the faces were those of a 
man and a lion on the right side ; the face of an ox on the left 
side ; and the face of an eagle ; with regard to their wings, two 
were stretched upwards, and two covered their bodies. Many 
other particulars are mentioned by the prophet, which I shall 
not here enlarge upon.^ 

A great variety of opinions have been held, both in ancient 
and modern times, concerning the meaning of these symbols, 
and what they are designed to represent, some of which I shall 
mention in another place. By most modern theologians they 
seem to be regarded as angels of the highest rank. The first 
mention of them in Holy Scriptures is upon the occasion of the 
expulsion of our first parents from Paradise, ".^nrf he drove out 
the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden cheruhbns, 
and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of 
the tree oflife.^^* The word which in our translation is rendered 
placedy means properly caused to dwell, or placed in a tabernacle/ 



1 Philip, ii. ir>. ^cez-upt; iv Ko<rfxeB. 2 Revel, i. 20. 

n Ezek. i. C. 10, 11. i Genes, iii. 21. f) Heb. p»i 



INTRODUCTION. 



:Ivii 



and it was on this account probably that in the Septnagint 
translation, the expression is referred to Adam. " AdI he cast 
out Adam, and caused him to dwell opposite the garden of Eden. 
And he placed in order the cherubim, and the flaming sword ivhich 
turned to keep the ivay of the tree of life.^''^ The word in question 
is used by Jeremiah to denote God's presence in his tabernacle 
in Shiloh.'^ It may be remarked also that, in the original, the 
phrase is not simply that God placed cherubim at the east of 
the garden of Eden, but, as is evident from the particles pre- 
fixed to it, that he placed there the cherubim, namely such objects 
as were generally called by that name, and were familiar to the 
Jews. Had God given it in commission to angehc beings to 
keep watch and ward at the gate of Paradise, it would surely 
have been said upon this, as upon other occasions, that he sent 
them. When we reflect that these mystic beings, when only 
sculptured images, were symbols of the divine presence, and 
that God manifested himself in his tabernacle and in his tem- 
ple by a cloud and glory when the work was finished according 
to the pattern, and the cherubim with the ark and mercy-seat 
were in their places,^ surely some suspicion must enter our 
minds that these cherubim, before the gates of Paradise, might 
be stationed there for purposes connected with the worship of 
God after the fall. Indications of this are discoverable in other 
passages, as where it is said of Cain and Abel, that they brought 
an offering unto the Lord; a term implying that sacrifices were 
not offered in any place, according to the fancy of the worship- 
per. Again, after the murder and martyrdom of righteous 
Abel by his brother's hand, and th^ divine sentence passed 
upon the latter, he says, " Behold, thou hast driven me out this 
day from the face of the earth, and from thy face shall I be hid^^ 

1 Gr. Ka/ i^i^ttxt tov ASa/a., kai KAra>Kt<TiV avrov ctTriVAvri t« Tra.'pctS'ita-is 

TW? T/)U<f«?. 7CAI iTct^i TA ^ipn^tf/,, KAl THV (pXOytVUV ^0/Li<pAletV, TUV Tfi<^0 fAiVtlV 

<pvhti(r<ruv Thv ocfov tk ^uxh t»s ^ans- 

2 Jerem. vii. 12. 3 Exod. xl. 18— 38. 2 Chron. v. 7— 14- 
4 Genes, iv. 14. 



Xlviii INTRODUCTION. 

And it is subsequently stated, ^^Jlnd Cain went out from the pre- 
sence of the Lord.^^^ From these passages it seems to follow 
evidently that God was present, in some restricted sense, in 
one particular place, by departing from which Cain was hid 
from his face, whatever was intended by that expression. In 
this local sense, a temple or tabernacle dedicated to his worship, 
as prescribed by himself, might be called his presence; or in a 
still more peculiar sense, it might be so denominated, if in its 
sanctuary it contained any symbolical representation of God's 
universal dominion, and of his action every where ; or if any 
cloud or irradiation of his glory was there manifested to his 
worshippers.^ 

With regard to the flaming sword, which our translation 
seems to put into the hands of the cherubic watch, and which 
Milton has so finely paraphrased ; 

And on the east side of the garden place, 
Where entrance up from Eden easiest climbs, 
Cherubic watch, and of a sword the flame 
Wide-waving, all approach far off to fright 
And guard all passage to the tree of life. 

And again, 

They looking back all the eastern side beheld] 
Of Paradise so late their happy seat. 
Waved over by that flaming brand, the gate 
With dreadful faces thronged, and fiery arms. 

The words in the original may either be understood meta- 
phorically of a flame like a sword, or it may be translated a 
consuming flame, a flame of burning heat ; the original word^ 
often signifying an exhausting and violent heat. The word 
which we translate turned every way* is in Hithpael, and sig- 
nifies an action upon itself; it is used in the same conjugation 



1 Genes, iv. IC. 2 Exod. xl. 34—38. 

3 Heb. a-»n 1 Jleb. roDnnon 



INTRODUCTION. xlix 

in other passages, where the sense seems to be that of revolv- 
ing or roUing.^ Ezekiel in his vision of the cherubim, describ- 
ing the fire that preceded their appearance, says that it in- 
folded itself.^ 

The last vrords of the passage in question, to keep the way of 
the tree of life, admit of two opposite interpretations — either to 
shut it up from all access, or to prevent it from being wholly 
closed. Perhaps the following interpretation — that the end 
for which the cherubim and flaming sword were placed at the 
east of the garden of Eden, was to close for ever the way to 
the old tree of life, and also to open the way to one better 
suited to man's altered circumstances and situation — will re- 
concile both interpretations. As soon as man was expelled 
from Paradise, the original covenant was ended, and he was 
cut off from all the means of grace and spiritual life that it 
held forth ; and therefore it might be expected that his merci- 
ful and beneficent Creator would, in pursuance of the great 
scheme of salvation, through the promised seed of the woman, 
which he had thrown out to him as an anchor of hope, would 
supply him with other means suited to his fallen state, by 
which he might be renewed unto holiness, and gradually 
nourished in grace, so as at last to be prepared to undergo the 
sentence passed upon him with a prospect before him of enter- 
ing into that rest that remaineth for the people of God. 

Having, I trust, not upon slight grounds, made it appear 
probable, that the cherubim, by the Deity himself, were placed 
in the original temple or tabernacle, and were intimately con- 
nected with that form of worship which was instituted by him 
in consequence of that sad event, the fall of man from his 
primeval state of hohness and happiness; I shall next endea- 
vour to ascertain what these multiform images represented. 



1 Judges vii. 13. Job. xxxvii. 12. 

2 Ezek. i. 4. Heb. nnp'jno i^n 

7* 



INTRODUCTION. 

But I must first premise a few observations upon the legitimate 
mode of collecting truths of this description from Holy Scrip- 
ture, and I must here recall to the reader's recollection the 
observation of Solomon before quoted — It is the glory of God to 
conceal a tiling. A number of important truths are delivered 
in Holy Writ, which are veiled truths, which we shall never 
discover if we adhere to the letter, and content ourselves with 
admiring the richness and beauty of the setting, without pay- 
ing any attention to the gem it encircles or conceals. Some 
writers require a clear, distinct, and explicit statement, before 
they will admit any thing as revealed in Scripture, be the cir- 
cumstantial evidence of the fact ever so strong. For instance 
some eminent theologians deny the Divine origin of sacrifices^ 
because no command of God to Adam or Noah to offer them 
is recorded to have been given ; yet one should think the prac- 
tice of righteous Abel, and of Noah, perfect in his generations, 
and God's acceptance of their respective sacrifices/ was a 
sufficient proof that this was no act of will-worship, but one of 
obedience to a Divine institution. The circumstance that God 
clothed Adam and Eve in the skins of beasts, proves that beasts 
had been slain, which were most probably offered upas victims 
representing the great atonement, the promised seed — and the 
clothing of them in their skins was an indication that they 
wanted garments, in the place of their own innocency and 
righteousness, to cover their nakedness, and that they now 
stood as clothed in the righteousness of Him whose heel was 
to be bruised for them. The distinction also of clean and unclean 
beasts directly sanctioned by the Deity, and which alone might 
be offered in sacrifice,^ is another circumstance confirmative of 
the common opinion. 

God, both in his word and in his works, for the exercise and 
improvement of the intellectual powers of his servants, and 

1 Genes, iv. 4. viii. 20, 21. 2 Ibid, and yii. 2, 3. 



INTRODUCTION. H 

that — " By reason of use they may have their senses exercised to 
discern both good and evil ;"* has rendered it indispensable that 
those who would understand them, and gain a correct idea of 
his plan in them, should collect and place in one point of view 
things that in Nature and Scripture are scattered over the 
whole surface, so that by comparing one part with another 
they may arrive at a sound conclusion. Hence it happens 
that, in Scripture, when any truth is first to be brought for- 
ward, it is not by directly and fully enunciating and defining 
it, so that he who runs may read and comprehend it, but it is 
only incidentally alluded to, or some circumstance narrated 
which, if duly weighed and traced to its legitimate conse- 
quences, puts the attentive student in possession of it. Such 
notices are often resumed, and further expanded, in subsequent 
parts of the sacred volume, and sometimes we are left to col- 
lect that an event has happened, or an institution delivered to 
the patriarchal race, without its being distinctly recorded, from 
circumstances which necessarily or strongly imply it. In a 
trial in a court of justice it very commonly happens that no 
direct proof of an event can be produced, and yet the body of 
circumstantial evidence is so concatenated and satisfactory as 
to leave no doubt upon the minds of the jury as to the nature 
of the verdict they ought to deliver. It would be a great and 
irreparable loss to the devout and sober student of Holy Scrip- 
ture, if in his endeavours to become acquainted with the differ- 
ent parts of it, he is to be precluded from forming an opinion as 
to certain events and doctrines, because it has pleased the Wis- 
dom of God to record and reveal them not directly and at once, 
but indirectly, in many parcels, and under various forms. 

To apply this reasoning to the subject I am discussing. 
Having rendered it probable that the cherubim placed in a 
tabernacle at the east of the Garden of Eden, represented the 

1 Heb. V. 14. 



hi INTRODUCTION. 

same objects, and were so far synonymous, wiih those after- 
wards placed in the Jewish Tabernacle in the most holy place 
overshadowing the mercy-seat, and that (he Divine Presence 
was more particularly to be regarded as taking there its con- 
stant station, and there occasionally manifesting itself by a 
cloud and a fiery splendour, I shall next endeavour to show 
what the cherubic images really symbolized. 

The word Cherub, in the Hebrew language, has no root ; 
for the derivation of it from a particle of similitude and a w^ord 
signifying the mighty or strong ones, which is proposed by 
Parkhurst and the followers of Mr Hutchinson, seems to me 
not satisfactory. Archbishop Newcome^ and others derive it 
from a Chaldee root, which signifies to plough, and the radi- 
cal idea seems to be that of strength and power, which will 
agree with the nature of the derivative, as indicating the pow- 
ers, whether physical or metaphysical, that rule under God. 
Other divines, as God is said to ride upon the cherubim, and 
they are called his chariot, would derive the word, by transpo- 
sition, from a root which signifies to ride f but if a transposi- 
tion of the letters of the word may be admitted, I should pre- 
fer deriving it from a root which signifies to bless or to curse,^ 
since, as we shall see, the cherubim are instruments of good 
or evil, according as God sees fit to employ them ; fruitful 
seasons and every earthly blessing being brought about by their 
ministry. 

The word Cherub, pi. cherubim, considered as derived from 
any of the roots last mentioned, conveys therefore the idea of 
strength and power; of God's action upon and by them, expressed 
by his riding or sitting upon them, and inhabiting them; as 
likewise by his employing them as instruments both of good 
or evil, of blessing and cursing. 

That the cherubim are powers or rulers in nature is evident, 

1 Newc. Ezek. c. i. 10, note. 2 331 3 '^-^2 



INTRODUCTION. liii 

as was before observed, from their symbols — the man, the lion, 
the ox, and the eagle. It is singular that amongst the de- 
scendants of the three sons of Noah, the three last animals 
should be adopted into their religion, — the ox, the Egyptian 
Apis, by the descendants of Ham / the lion, as a symbol of 
light, by the Persians,^ derived from Shem; and the eagle by 
the Greeks and other nations descended from JapheL^ 

These powers, be they what they may, are described in 
Scripture as forming a chariot on which the Deity is represented 
as riding, and sometimes in such terms as bring to our mind, 
to compare great things with small, the chariots and chari- 
oteering of mortals. Thus we are told of The chariot of the 
cherubim that spread out their wings, and covered the ark of the 
covenant of the Lord.* And in EzekiePs mystic visions, the 
glory of Jehovah sometimes went up from the cherubic chariot 
to the temple, when The house vias filled with the cloud, and the 
court was full of the brightness of the Lord^s glory. ^ And again, 
the glory of the Lord departs from the house, and stands over 
the cherubim, when mounting on high from the earth. The 
glory of the God of Israel was over them above.^ A common 
epithet of God, as king of Israel, was that of Insessor of the 
cherubim,'' Whose name is called by the name of the Lord God 
of Hosts that dwelleth between the cherubim; or he that sitteth 
upon, above, or between the cherubim ; or, as it may be ren- 
dered, Inhabiteth the cherubim. These expressions allude, not 



1 Other descendants of Ham, as the Phoenicians, regarded the ox or heifer 
as a sacred animal. Baal was worshipped as an ox as well as a fly. (Tobit, 
i.5.) 

2 Mithras is to be seen with the head of a lion and the body of a man, 
having four wings, two of which are extended towards the sky, and the other 
two towards the ground, Montfaucon, i. 232. Corap. Ezek. i. 11. 

3 Every one knows that the eagle was sacred to the Grecian Jupiter. 

4 1 Chron. xxviii. 18. 

5 Ezek. X. 4. 6 Ibid. 19. 

7 1 Sam. xiv. 4. 2 Sam. vi. 2. 2 Kings, xix. 15. Ps. Ixxx. 1, xcix. 
l,&c. 



liv INTRODUCTION. 

only to the presence of God in his tabernacle and temple 
between or above the sculptured and symbolical cherubim, but 
to his riding upon, sitting" upon, or inhabiting, that is ruling 
and directing those powers of whatever description, which are 
symbolized by those images, or signified by that name. 

When the Lord came to deliver David from his enemies, it 
is stated that he rode upon a cherub ;^ and the prophet Habak- 
kuk, alluding probably to the delivery of the Israelites by the 
destruction of the Egyptians in the Red Sea, exclaims, Thou 
didst walk through the sea with thine horses, through the heap of 
great waters;^ and again, with a prospective view before him, 
perhaps, of some still mightier deliverance of the church from 
her enemies, " Was the Lord displeased against the rivers ? was 
thine anger against the rivers ? Was thy wrath against the sea, 
that thou didst ride upon thy horses and upon thy chariots of sal- 
vation?^'^ He uses the same instruments when his will is to 
inflict a curse and execute judgments. The Lord will come with 
fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger 
with fury and to rebuke with flames of fire.* In Ezekiel's vision, 
coals of fire were taken from between the cherubim to scatter 
over Jerusalem.^ 

Having noticed the ideal meaning of these mystic symbols, and 
their connection with and subservience to Jehovah of Hosts, as 
the God of Israel, of Israel both according to the flesh and the 
spirit;® our next inquiry must be whether there are no physical 
or metaphysical beings or objects, concerning which the sanie 
things are predicated in Holy Scripture, as concerning the 
cherubim; for if there are, as equals of the same are equal to 
one another, it follows that these things must be synonymous. 

Every student of Holy Writ, when he turns his attention to 
this observation, will immediately recollect passages in whicli 

1 2 Savt. xxii. 11. Ps. xviii. 10 2 Hahak. iii. 15. 

3 Ihid. 8. 4 Isai. Ixvi. IC. 

5 Eteh. X. 2. C. 1 Cor. i. 18. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Iv 



the same things are predicated of the heavens ; thus it is said 
of God, as the God of Israel — Who rideth upon the heavens in 
thy help, and in his excellency upon the sky.^ And again, Extol 
him that rideth upon tht heavens.^ Him that rideth upon the 
heaven of heavens that were of old .^ Everyone knows that, 
in Holy Scripture, God is also perpetually described as he who 
sitteth upon the heavens ;'^ that the heaven is God's throne, and 
the earth his footstool;^ that The Lord hath prepared his throne 
in the heavens,^ that he dwelleth in the heavens, though they 
cannot contain him ;'' that he filleth heaven and earth. ^ 

With regard to Blessings and Curses, that the Heavens are 
the primary instruments by which God bestows the one and 
inflicts the other, is evident from many passages of Holy Writ. 
Thus it is said in Deuteronomy,^ The Lord shall open unto thee 
his good treasure the heavens," to give the rain unto thy land in 
his season, and to bless all the work of thine hand. The prophet 
Hosea has a passage, in which the hands by which blessings 
and fertility are transmitted to man step by step are strikingly 
described. And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear, saith 
the Lord, I will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth, 
and the earth shall hear the corn and the wine and the oil ; and 
they shall hear Jezreel.** Thus the blessing descends from God 
by the heavens to the earth, producing abundance for the sup- 
port and comfort of man. And with respect to curses it is said. 
The heaven that is over thee shall be hrass.^^ Ye are cursed with a 
curse, saith Malachi/or ye have robbed me, even this whole nation. 
The curse alluded, was the shutting of the windows of heaven.^^ 

From all these passages, it is evident that the same things 



1 


Deut. xxxiii. 26. 


2 


Ps. Ixviii. 4. 


3 


I hid. 33. 


4 


Ibid. ii. 4. 


5 


MaUh. V. 34, 35. 


6 


Ps. ciii. 19. 


7 


Ihid. cxxiii. 1. 1 Kings, viii. 27. 


8 


Jerem. xxiii. 24, 


9 


Deut. xxviii. 12. 






10 


Heb. D^nari nM jitan nxix m 


11 


//05. ii. 21, 22. 


12 


Ibid, xxvii. 23. 


13 


Malach. iii. 9, 10 



Ivi INTRODUCTION. 

are predicated both of the Heavens and the Cherubim, and that, 
therefore, they are synonymous terms, and signify the same 
powers. But this leads to another inquiry. What are the 
heavens? This is a query which at first every one thinks he 
can answer, but yet when the term comes to be sifted, it will 
be found that few have any definite idea of its real meaning. 
Generally speaking, the expanse over our heads, and the bodies 
it contains, are understood by the word Heavens ; but when 
analysed, it will be found chiefly to indicate powers in action 
contained in that expanse, and which act upon these bodies ; 
powers that in the various systems of the universe have vari- 
ous centres dispersed throughout space, each having a local 
or partial action upon its own system, and all derived originally, 
and still maintained, from and by one parent fountain, the 
centre of all irradiation, of all light, of all life and energy. 

In order to ascertain what the word heaven, or heavens, 
really means, the most satisfactory way is to submit it to ana- 
lysis. In the Bible there are three terms employed to signify 
the heavens and heavenly powers, one of which^ is usually 
rendered the Heavens; another,^ the Sky; and a third," the 
Firmament. I shall consider each of these terms. 

1. Heaven, or the heavens. — This word, in the Hebrew lan- 
guage, is derived from a root,^ which signifies to dispose or 
place, with skill, care, and order, as say the lexicographers ; so 
that literally the common plural term would be the disposers or 
placers. It is singular, and worthy of particular notice, that 
the Pelasgians, according to Herodotus, gave no other names 
to their deities than that of gods,^ so calling them because they 
were the placers'^ of all things in the world, and had the uni- 
versal distribution of them.'' We see here that the Grecian 

5 0toi. C S-ivTif. 

7 0i»c ^» 7rpo7avo/netarAV o-<pt6t,( etvo ts toioutk, ort aoufxa) Siktic tu. TarTet 
vfnyixttTcLncLt 7ra.<ra.i vofxuc u;^ov. Eviterp. c. r»2. 



INTRODUCTION. ^ Ivii 

gods — which, as has been proved in another place/ were sub- 
sequent to the original chaotic state of the heavens and the 
earth when the one was without hght, and the other without 
form and void — were really synonymous with those ruling phy- 
sical powers which God employed as his instruments first in 
the formation of the heavenly bodies, and next in that of their 
organized appariture, whether vegetable or animal ; and lastly, 
in maintaining those motions or revolutions in the bodies just 
named, which he had produced, and other physical phenomena 
which were necessary for the welfare of the whole system and 
its several parts. These powers, whatever name we call them 
by,* form the disposers or placers, the heavens in action : these 
are the Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva of the Greeks and Romans, 
and the various deities of other nations : For all gods of the 
nations are idols, saitli the Psalmist,^ but Jehovah made the heavens, 
or the powers symbolized by the idols of the nations. These 
are those powers which, under God — who, as the charioteer of 
the universe, directs them in all their operations, whether in 
heaven or on earth, to answer the purposes of his providence — 
execute the laws that have received his sanction. These are 
the physical cherubim represented by the earthly rulers — the 
man, the lion, the ox, and the eagle — these the chariot and 
throne of the Deity ; the hands also by which he taketh hold 
of material things ; the feet by which he treads on the earth 
and other planets. 

Those sublime metaphors of the prophet Nahum — Jehovah 
hath his way in the whirlwind, and in the storm and the clouds are 
the dust of his feet* — though at first sight appearing only magnifi- 
cent figures, when analyzed will be found literally true. Knowest 
thou the ordinances of the heaven? canst thou set the dominion thereof 
in the earth ?^ saith God ; showing that he, by his instruments 

1 See Appendix, note 1. 2 See above, p. xxxiv- 

3 Ps. xcvi. 5. 4 Nekhum, i. 3. 

5 Job, xxxviii. 33. 

8* 



Iviii INTRODUCTION. 

the heavens, rules the earth : this is said in stronger terms, 
when the heaven is declared to be God's throne, and the earth 
his footstool, which implies that God acts upon the earth by 
what are called symbolically his feet — those powers therefore 
that produce whirlwinds and storms in our atmosphere ; that 
by their impact upon our planet cause evaporation, and conse- 
quently form the clouds, are the metaphorical feet of Jehovah, 
so that the clouds with strict propriety may be called the dust 
excited by the tread of his feet. When the Psalmist says of 
God, He sitteth upon the cherubim, let the earth be moved, what 
beauty, propriety, and force is there in the expression when it 
is recollected that the physical cherubim are those powers that 
have complete dominion over the earth, and cause its motions. 
2. The Sky. — The word we render by the term sky, or 
skies, for it is always used in the plural, is derived from a root,* 
which signifies to comminute, grind, or wear by friction, imply- 
ing powers that come in contact from opposite directions, so as 
to be antagonist or conflicting powers. The cherubim placed 
at each end of the mercy seat had their faces inward, or look- 
ing towards each other,^ so that they appeared to symbolize 
antagonist powers, as if one was a vis centrifuga, and the other 
a vis centripeta. The pillars of the earth are the Lord's, and he 
hath set the world upon them;^ and these two antagonist forces, 
that which flies from and that which seeks the centre, form 
that, so called, universal gravitation, which, under God, up- 
holds the universe, keeps all its wholes and their parts in their 
places, maintains their motions, and mutual actions upon each 
other. But though these, as moving in an opposite direction, 
may be called antagonist or conflicting powers, yet their oppo- 
sition is not enmity, but universal harmony and love. This 
Philo seems to intimate, when he says — a station,* over against 



1 pn» 2 Exod. xxxvii. 8, 0. 3 1 Sam. u. 8, 

4 Dc Chcrvhim. 85. F. G. Ed. Col. AUobr. 1643. 



INTRODUCTION. liX 

Paradise, was assigned to the cherubim, and the flaming 
sword, not as to enemies about to struggle and fight, but as 
to those that were most intimate and friendly. It is said of 
the cherubic animals, in Ezekiel, that they ran and returned as 
the appearance of a flash of lightning,^ which seems to intimate 
a constant efflux and influx of inconceivable rapidity. Ac- 
cordingly the effluxes of light and heat from the solar orb in 
our own system are never intermitted, and their velocity, for 
that of hght has been measured, exceeds that of any other 
moving substance. With respect to the fuel, if I may so ex- 
press myself, that maintains this constant expenditure, httle 
seems yet to be known of it philosophically; and we can only 
form conjectures with respect to it derived from the general 
analogy of nature, as far as it is submitted to the observation 
of our senses. On earth we know that there can be no com- 
bustion or evolution of light and heat without the access of air 
to an ignited body; and that a constant supply of some combus- 
tible substance to replace the constant expenditure of fuel is 
also necessary. Therefore, reasoning from analogy, something 
similar must take place at the great focus of hght and heat. 
There must be an influx of air and a supply of combustible 
matter. That there is such an influx is rendered further pro- 
bable by other analogical arguments. In man, who is called a 
microcosm, or world in miniature, there is as incessant a return 
of the blood to the heart in a negative state by one set of ves- 
sels, as there is an issue of it in a positive state by another. 
The lungs also inspire the air in one state, and expire it in 
another : and by this alternate flux and reflux life is maintain- 
ed ; but suspend it beyond a certain period and death is the 
result. Again, the rivers are constantly discharging their 
waters into the sea by one channel and receiving them back 
again by another. Plants likewise, and animals, derive their 

1 Ezek.lU. 



Ix INTRODUCTION. 

nutriment from the earth and from the heavens, and under 
other forms return it again to the sources from which it flowed. 
So that it seems to be a general law that where there is an 
efflux there must also be an influx. 

3. The Firmament. — The proper translation of the word, 
which our version, after the septuagint, renders ^rmamcnl, is — 
the expansion. And God said, Let there be an ex'pansion, and 
let it divide the waters, &c. The cause of expansion is heat, 
which naturally divides and separates that in which it acts; 
as we see in the case of evaporation and the ascent of steam: 
and not only this, but the expansive force consolidates that 
whereon its impact is, whence our translation renders the 
word, after the Greek, s"«g«a^*, the firmament, that which ren- 
ders all things ^rm, the action of which produces the cohesion 
of the atoms of bodies, and their agglomeration round a partial 
or general centre : in this last acceptation it is synonymous 
with the term attraction, and in the former with that of repul' 
sion. From these considerations we may readily understand 
why the Psalmist calls it. The Firmament of his power or 
strength."^ 

The terms expansion,' then, and firmament, express the mat- 
ter of the heavens in a state of action, going from or returning 
to its central fountain ; for every system, as well as its own sun 
and planets, has doubtless its own heavens, probably never 
stagnant, but incessantly issuing from a centre of irradiation, 
as the blood from the heart in a positive state, and returning 
in a negative state to that centre where it is, as it were, again 
oxygenated, and circulates to the flammantia mcenia mundi; 
and so 

Labitur, et lahetur in omne volubilis termm. 

But though every system probably forms a distinct portion of 
creation, yet, reasoning from analogy, and the general plan of 

i Ps. Cl. 1 



INTRODUCTION. lx\ 

the Deity, as far as we are acquainted with it, there is every 
reason to believe that the universe consists of systems so con- 
catenated as to form one great whole, the centre of which may 
be the Heaven of Heavens, the presence-chamber of the God 
of Gods and Lord of Lords; in whom and from whom is all 
motion, light, and expansion. What may be the links that 
connect the several systems can only be conjectured. It has 
been observed with regard to comets, that they wander from one 
solar system to another ;* if this be the case they evidently be- 
long to two systems, and their perihelion in one, will be their 
aphelion in another, and thus they may form connecting links 
between them. This concatenation of systems may also have 
a common motion round their glorious centre, forming the 
grand cycle, or year, of the Universe. 

Having, I trust, made it evident, or at least extremely pro- 
bable, that the Heavens and the Cherubim, physically con- 
sidered, indicate the same powers, I shall next advert to some 
passages of Scripture that seem to lift up the veil which covers 
these mysterious symbols, and show us expressly what they 
represent. 

In that sublime description of the descent of the Deity for 
the help and deliverance of David in the eighteenth Psalm, we 
have these words; He rode upon a cherub and did fly; yea, he 
did fly upon the wings of the wind. Here we have one of these 
symbolical beings introduced and explained — as the latter 
hemistich of the verse is clearly exegetical of the former — by 
the phrase, The wings of the wind.'^ If we next turn to the 
hundred-and-fourth Psalm, in a parallel passage, we find an 
explanation of this latter metaphor. He maketh the clouds hi^ 
charioty and walketh upon the wings of the wind. Whence it 
appears that the wings of the wind, by an elegant metonomy, 

1 La Place, System. &c. by Harte, ii. 337. 

2 Parkhurst renders these words, The icings of the Spirit, but he stands 
alone in this. 



Ixii INTRODUCTION. 

mean the clouds, consequently the clouds are a cherub. In 
various parts of the Old Testament, God's presence and glory 
are manifested by and in a cloud. When he led his hosts from 
Egypt through the Red Sea, he went before them by day in a 
pillar of a cloudy and by night in a pillar of fire ;^ when he was 
about to descend upon Mount Sinai, he said — Lo,Icome unto thee 
in a thick cloud. ^ When the tabernacle was set up in the wil- 
derness, and the work was finished. Then a cloud covered the tent 
of the congregation, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.^ 
When Solomon's Temple was built, and the ark brought into 
the oracle, and placed under the wings of the cherubim, and the 
priests were come forth, then The cloud filled the house, so that 
the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud: for the 
glory of the Lord had filled the house of the Lord.* As God thus 
came of old in a cloud, and by it manifested his presence to his 
people and in his house ; so likewise when he spoke to them, it 
was from a cloud, as in the passage above quoted — Lo, I come to 
thee in a thick cloud, that thy people may hear when I speak with 
thee. And again, And a cloud covered the mount; and the glory 
of the Lord abode upon Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six 
days; and the seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of 
the cloud.* And in another place, And the Lord descended in 
the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of 
the Lord.^ And the Lord came down in a cloud, and spake unto 
him, and took of the Spirit that was upon him, and gave it unto the 
seventy elders.'^ And in the New Testament, at the Transfigu- 
ration, Behold a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice out of 
the cloud.^ From these passages it appears to follow, that when 
the Deity thought proper to address his prophets or his people 
by the voice of words, it was from a cloud. 



1 Exod. xiii. 21. 2 Ibid. xix. 0, IC. 1 Kings, viii. 12. 

3 Exod. x\. 33, 34. 4 1 Kings, viii. C— 11. 

5 Exod. xxiv. 15, IC. Ihid. xxxiv. 5. 

7 mmb.xi.23. 8 Matth. xvii. 3. 



i 



INTRODUCTION. IxlH 

But not only did God descend to communicate with his 
people, and to reside as it were amongst them in a cloud; but 
when our Saviour went up into Heaven, it was upon a cloud, 
which Athanasius calls mounting the cherubim;'^ and when he 
comes again, it will be in the same manner, attended by his 
holy angels. When he is said, in the Apocalypse, to ride upon 
a White Horse, and the armies which were in heaven to follow 
him upon white horses ;'' by these white horses are meant white 
clouds, as is evident from other passages of Holy Writ ; as 
where it is said — Behold, he cometh with clouds.^ Again, God's 
going to execute judgments upon any nation is sometimes 
represented by his riding upon a cloud. So when the prophet 
pronounces the burthen of Egypt, his exordium is — Behold, the 
Lord rideth upon a swift cloud, and shall come into Egypt. 

So immediate is God's action upon the clouds described to 
be in the Bible, that the thunder is called his voice, as in Job 
— Hear attentively the noise of his voice, and the sound that goeth 
out of his mouth. He directeth it under the whole heaven, and his 
lightning unto the ends of the earth God thundereth marvel- 
lously with his voice :* and when he descended upon Mount 
Sinai, it was with mighty thunderings.^ Considering the 
benefits and blessing that God confers upon mankind by the 
ministry of the Cherub-clouds, his horses and chariots of salva- 
tion, we need not wonder at the Psalmist's expression — His 
strength is in the clouds ® Acting by them, he causes it to rain 
upon one city and not upon another. "^ Are there any, says Jeremiah, 
among the vanities of the Gentiles that can cause rain ? or can the 
Heavens give showers ? Art not thou He, Lord our God.^ 

The Deity superintends his whole creation, not only sup- 



1 Opera, ii. 3017, D. 2 Revel, xix. 11, 14. 

3 Ibid, i. 7, comp. Dan. vii. 13. Rev. xiv. 14. .^cts, i. 11. 

4 Job, xxxvii. 2—5. 5 Exod. ix. 28. 
6 Ps. Ixviii. 34. 7 Amos, iv. 7. 
8 Jerem. xiv. 22. 



IxiV INTRODUCTION. 

porting the system that he has established, and seeing that the 
powers to which he has given it in charge to govern under 
him, execute his physical laws; but himself, where he sees fit, 
in particular instances dispensing with these laws : restraining 
the clouds, in one instance, from shedding their treasures ; and 
in another, permitting them to descend in blessings. Acting 
every where upon the atmosphere, and those secondary powers 
that produce atmospheric phenomena, as circumstances con* 
nected with his moral government require. Thus it is that 
his strength is in the clouds; that his presence, either to bless or 
to curse, is manifested by them ; that his voice is heard from 
them ; his glory irradiates from them. On this account also 
they are called his paths.^ 

The Lord is said to come with fire, or rather in fire ;■ to 
descend in fire ;' to be a consuming fire ;* to speak out of the 
fire;* from all which passages it seems to follow, that fire or 
heat form also one of the physical cherubim upon which the 
Deity sitteth, or which he inhabiteth, and by which he acteth. 

Light appears entitled to the same distinction ; for God is 
said to dwell in the light that no man can approach unto,^ and 
to cover himself with light as with a garment.'' 

Lastly, air or wind, which God bringeth out of his treasury ; 
which is the type, and, on the day of Pentecost, was the pre- 
cursor of the Holy Spirit, both in Hebrew and Greek* is ex- 
pressed by the same word distingushed only by its adjuncts ; 
and is one of the main instruments by which God acts upon 
our globe, both in dispensing blessings and curses, and without 
which our life could not be sustained a moment, is evidently a 



1 Ps. Ixv. 14. 

2 Isai. Ixvi. 15. Heb, 8^m3, the Septuagint seem to have read rw. 

3 Exod. xix. lb. 4 DeiU. iv. 24. 
5 J bid. 36. C 1 Tim. vi. 16. 
7 Ps.eiv.2, 8 nnrviwiu*. 



INTRODUCTION. IxV 

cherub, or ruling physical power, of the same rank wiih heat 
and light. 

The statement 1 have here given of the physical cherubim, 
is singularly confirmed in Ezekiel's vision. / looked, says he, 
and behold a whirlwind came out of the north, a great cloud, and 
a fire infolding itself, and a brightness was about it.^ Here we 
see the appearance of the symbolical animals was preceded by 
that of the physical agents they symbolized — the wind, the 
cloud, the fire, and the light. The reason why the clouds are 
particularly signalized as God's chariots, appears to be because 
they are instinct with all those principles by which God acts 
upon the earth ; and therefore they are described as carrying 
him, since they are the instruments by which his will has full 
accomplishment. 

It is singular, and worthy of particular notice, that God is 
also said to dwell in darkness. The Lord hath said that he would 
dwell in the thick darkness f and again — Moses drew near to 
the thick darkness where God was.^ In the Psalms it is said 
— He made darkness his secret (or hiding) place.^ Darkness 
was the state of the original heavens, before God formed the 
light, to which this passage seems to be an allusion. In Isaiah, 
the term create is applied to darkness, and /orm to the production 
of hght ;^ from which it appears that it was out of darkness that 
light was formed ; and these two opposites seem to bear the 
same relation to each other as positive and negative electricity, 
or heat and cold. Darkness was that in which the Divine 
Spirit operated, when by incubation motion, followed by light 
and expansion, was educed, and the sea brake forth from the 
crust of the earth as from the womb; when the cloud was the 
garment thereof, and thick darkness a swaddling band for it.^ 

In the different visions of the appearance of the Deity, as 

1 Ezek. i. 4. 2 2 Chron. vi. 1. 

3 Exod. XX. 21. 4 Ps. xviii. 11. 

5 Isai. xlv. 7. 6 Job, xxxviii. 8, 9. 

9* 



IXvi INTRODUCTION. 

the Insessor of the chariot of the cherubim, it is stated, that 
expanded over their heads was a firmament like crystal or ice ; 
that above this firmament was a sapphire throne; that one sat 
oh this throne, round about whom was the appearance of a 
rainbow.^ So hkewise in the vision of the apostolic prophet, 
St John — A throne was set in heaven, and one sat upon it, 
and there was a rainbow round about the throne, and before 
the throne was a sea of glass like unto crystal; and in the 
thid^ 6i the throne ]and round (about the throne were four 
cherubic animals, which proclaim the Trisagium.^ When 
Moses, Aaron and his sons, and the elders of Israel went up 
into Mount Sin^i, and saw the God of Israel, He stood upon 
what ^'sts like t pavement of sapphire and as it were the body 
of heaven in its clearness.^ In all these passages, the same 
idea seems to prevail with respect to the firmament — it is like 
ice or the terrible crystal in one — a sea of glass like crystal, or 
crystallizing, emitting the splendour of crystal in the other^^ 
like the body of heaven in its clearness in the third. 

The footstool of the Deity, the pavement on which his throne 
is placed, is Over or above the heads of the cherubim; and 
though we cannot comprehend exactly the precise meaning of 
the figures employed, yet the general idea seems to be that of 
irradiation; and by these representations the claim of Jehm'ah 
the God of Israel is indicated to supremacy and entire domin- 
ion over the physical cherubim, or the heavens in a state of 
action, and as the sole fountain and centre df that incessant 
radiation and glory, and of those constant effluxes by which 
the whole universe of systems and woi'lds is maintained. 

It seems probable, therefore, that otie of the principal reasons 
why the cherubic symbols were placed in the adytum of the 
Jewish tabernacle and temple Was not only to represent those 



1 EM. i. 82, 26, 28. 2 ficceZ. iv. 2, 3, 6, 7, 8. 

3 Etod. xxiv. 10. 



INTRODUCTION. Ixvii 

powers that govern under God in nature, but likewise to indi- 
cate his Supreme and only Godhead, and that his people \vere 
to beware of worshipping these powers or their symbols, be- 
cause they derived so much benefit from their ministerial 
agency, but to worship Him alone who created them, employ- 
ed them, and operated in and by them. 

The ancients seem generally to have regarded the name 
and symbols as indicating and representing more than one ob- 
ject. Philo Judasus, who has written a treatise upon those 
placed at the east of the garden of Eden, sometimes interprets 
ihem physically, and sometimes metaphysically. Physically, in 
one place, he considers one cherub j^g representing the sphere 
of the fixed stars, and the other that of the planets,* and in 
another he asks, whether they may not signify the two hen^r 
ispheres,^ both of which amount to the whole universe.^ The 
flaming sword, he conjectures, either represents the general 
motion of the heavens and planets, or else is a symbol of the 
sun.* Metaphysically, he considers the two cherubim ^s 
symbolizing the Power and Goodness of the Deity, and the 
flaming sword the Logos or his essential Word ; and this inter- 
pretation he seems to think wets divinely suggested to him.^ 
Clement of Alexandria, in some degree, seems to incline to the 
opinions, on this subject, of his compatriot Philo, but he ex- 
presses himself obscurely,® and, after alluding to other inter- 
pretations, concludes with mentioning "T/ie doxologising spirits 
whom the cherubim symbolize. ^^"^ Irenseus, the learned Bishop of 
Lyons, who had conversed with Polycarp, St John's disciple, 
regards these mystic objects as physical and ecclesiastical sym- 
bols, taking chiefly into consideration their number. The four 
quarters of the globe, the four winds, the four gospels, the four 

1 Dc Cherubim. 1613. 86. A. B. 2 Ihid. D. 

3 Ibid. 85. G. 4 Ibid. D. E. 5 Hid. 86. F. G. 

6 Clem. Alex. Stromata. 1. v. 241. ed. Sylburg. 1592. 

7 In allusion probably to Isaiah vi. 3^ and Revel, iv. 8. 



Ixviii INTRODUCTION. 

universtil covenants given to man — each of these he appears 
to regard as figured by the cherubic animals ;* and he might 
have added the four physical cherubim, spirit or wind, light, 
expansion, and the clouds. Justin Martyr has a singular 
opinion on this subject. He thinks Ezekiel's cherubim sym- 
bolized Nebuchadnezzar when he was driven out from the 
society of man as a beast :^ when, according to the Septuagint 
which Justin used, he eat grass like an ox, his hair was like a 
IMs, and his nails like a bird's or eagle's. Athanasius has a 
remarkable passage, before alluded to, in which he says of 
Christ, that when he appeared upon earth, He bowed the hea- 
vens and came down, and that he again mounted the cherubim, 
and ascended into heaven,^ from whence it should seem that 
he had adopted the opinion, that the heavens, and the clouds 
were antitypes of the symbolical cherubim : yet in another 
passage of his works, he expressly places the seraphim and 
cherubim amongst the highest of the heavenly essences. " As 
we know," says he, "that there is a distinction of rank in the 
powers above, so there are also differences of station and know- 
ledge. The thrones, both the Seraphim and the Cherubim, learn 
from God immediately, as higher than all and nearest to God, 
and they instruct the inferior orders— but the lowest rank are 
the angels, which are also the instructors of men."* 

It seem.s evident from this statement of the opinions of both 
ancient Jews and Christians, that the sculptured Cherubim, in 
their opinion, represented physical as well as metaphysical ob- 
jects; in fact, the most general interpretation seems to be — 
that those powers that rule under God, either in his physical 
universe, or which, with regard to our planet, have power in 
his church, or over his people ; and also those spiritual essences 



1 .^dv. Hccrcs. 1. iii. c. 11. 

2 Q,uccst. ct Rcsp. ad Orthodox. Quo3St. xliv. 

3 Quccst. ad Jiniloch. cxxxvi. 

4 Dc commun. cssait. cd. Taris, 1C27, i. 238. 



INTRODUCTION. Ixix 

that approach nearest to him, in the purity of their natures, 
are the antitype of the cherubic forms. St Paul, describing 
the creation of all things by the Son of God, whether visible or 
invisible, mentions particularly /ottr ruling powers in nature and 
gi-ace — Thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers.^ This 
may be interpreted of all rule and government both in heaven 
and upon earth; which is all derived from Christ, as King of 
Kings and Lord of Lords, to whom M power is given in heaven 
and earth:^ who therefore is the Insessor of the cherubim, act- 
ing by all the powers that he hath created, whether physical 
or metaphysical, whether civil, ecclesiastical, or spiritual; for 
He upholdeth all things by the word of his power. ^ 

In the prophecy of Isaiah, and in the Apocalypse,* the six- 
winged beings called by the former The seraphim,^ and by 
St John living-creatures^ — which by most ancient writers are 
thought to be synonymous with the cherubim — are represented 
as repeating the Trisagium; the latter says — They rest not day 
and night, saying. Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty. This 
triple ascription of Holiness is thought by many to intimate a 
Trinity of Persons in the Godhead, and that the physical che- 
rubim or seraphim symbolically represent that mystery. Arch- 
deacon Sharp, and after him Archbishop Newcome,'' have ob- 
served, that this opinion is inconsistent with these symbolical 
animals falling down and worshipping the Lamb, and ascribing 
their redemption to him; an objection which appears to me not 



1 Coloss. i. IG. 2 Matth. xxviii. 18. 

3 Heh. i 3. 4 Isai. vi. 3. Rev. iv. 8. 

5 Heb.'o^cna' This name, which literally may be rendered hurners, phy- 
sically would signify the heavens in the most intense state of action } they are 
stated to have six wings, the upper pair veiling their faces, the lower pair cover- 
ing their feet, the intermediate pair being used for flight. See Isai. vi. 2. When 
our Saviour says of the wind — Thou hear est the sound thereof, hut canst not 
tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth ; may not the same thing be meant as 
by Isaiah's Description of the Seraphim ? 

6 Gr. ZuA. 

7 Sharp On the Cherubim, 305. Newcome's Ezekiel, i. 10, note. 



\XX INTRODUCTION. 

to have been satisfactorily answered. It should, however, be 
taken into consideration that the cherubim are symbols not 
solely o( physical, but of all governing powers; and that, there- 
fore, in order to interpret rightly any act of theirs, the circum- 
stances attending upon it should be carefully examined. If 
we consider the passages in the Apocalypse here alluded to, 
we shall find that when praise is to be rendered to God as 
Creator and Upholder of the universe, they then are stated to 
proclaim his Triune Deity, by saying — Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord 
God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to corned . This they do 
as the physical powers, under God, upholding the universe, 
especially as fire, light, and air; all of which, in passages of 
Scripture above noticed,^ appear to represent the Three Persons 
of the Holy Trinity. But when they are introduced as repre- 
senting the governing Powers of the universal Church, as they 
are when they fall down and worship the Lamb, the case is 
altered ; for those they then represent are amongst the re- 
deemed. 

One of my objects in treating so much at large upon this 
mysterious subject, w^as to counteract that tendency, often ob- 
servable in the writings of philosophers, to ascribe too much to 
the action of second causes, and the mechanism of the heavenly 
powers; as if they were sufficient of themselves, and without 
the intervention of the First Cause, to do all in all, and keep 
the whole machine and all its parts together and at work. 
Instead of regarding Him as receding further and further from 
our observation,^ my desire is to bring Him nearer and nearer 
to us, that we may see and acknowledge Him every where, as 
the main-spring of the universe, which animates, as it were, 
and upholds it in all its parts and motions — 

Lives through all life, extends tlirough all extent, 
Spreads undivided, operates unspent. 

1 Revel, ubisvpr. 2 See abovc,p. Ixiv. 3 JScc above, p. xxiv. 



'' INTRODUCTION. IXXl 

Maintaining his own laws by his own universal action upon 
and by his cherubim of glory. Without Him they can do 

NOTHING. 



I cannot conclude this Introduction without returning my 
grateful acknowledgements to the Board of Curators of the 
Hunterian Museum, for their kind permission to have drawings 
taken of such subjects in that superb collection as might an- 
swer my purpose; and to Messrs. Clift and Owen, the conser- 
vator and assistant-conservator of the museum, for their readi- 
ness, on all occasions, to show and explain to me such articles 
under their care as I had occasion to inspect; to the friendly 
attentions of the latter gentleman I am particularly indebted, 
not only for his exertions to serve me in the museum, but for 
his valuable information on numerous scientific subjects, on 
which I had occasion to consult him, which his deep knowledge 
of comparative anatomy, and familiar acquaintance with the 
classification of the animal kingdom, enabled him to give me. 
To the gentlemen connected with the British Museum and 
that of the Zoological Society, I have to make similar acknow- 
ledgments for the kindness and information with which my 
inquiries on several subjects have uniformly been answered. 

As one half of this work was printed before the publica- 
tion of Dr Roget's admirable Treatise, it will not be deemed 
wonderful that, in some instances, we have treated of the 
same subject. The history, habits, and instincts of ani- 
mals, are so intimately connected with their physiological 
structure, especially their external anatomy, that it is scarcely 
possible, in order to prove the adaptation of means to an end, 
to treat satisfactorily of the former without occasional illustra- 
tions from the latter. After the doctor's work appeared, I 
removed many things of this kind from my MS., upon which 



Ixxii INTRODUCTION. 

he had enlarged. The moult of Crustaceans, however, seemed 
to me, and to every friend whom I consulted, so necessary to 
make the history of that Class complete, that, though mostly 
derived from the same source as that of my learned Co-nomi- 
nee, I did not expunge it. 



THE 



HISTORY, HABITS, AND INSTINCTS 
OF ANIMALS. 

CHAPTER I. 

Creation of *Rnimals, 

In no part of creation are the power, wisdom, and goodness, 
of its beneficent and almighty Author more signally conspicu- 
ous than in the various animals that inhabit and enliven our 
globe. The infinite diversity of their forms and organs ; the 
nice adaptation of these to their several functions ; the beauty 
and elegance of a large number of them ; the singularity of 
others ; the variety of their motions ; their geographical distri- 
bution ; but, above all, their pre-eminent utility to mankind, 
in every state and stage of life, render them objects of the 
deepest interest both to rich and poor, high and low, wise and 
unlearned, so that arguments in proof of these primary attri- 
butes of the Godhead, drawn from the habits, instincts, and 
other adjuncts of the animal creation, are likely to meet with 
more universal attention, to be more generally comprehended, 
to make a deeper and more lasting impression upon the mind, 
to direct the heart more fervently and devotedly to the maker 
and giver of these interesting beings, than those which are 
drawn from more abstruse sources, though really more elevated 
and sublime. 

The history of the animal kingdom naturally commences 
with the creation of animals, and the great events preparatory to 
it, for when the Almighty Creator, in his wisdom, and by 
the word of his power, had first brought into being, and after- 



2 CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

wards set in order, the heavens and the earth ; had caused the 
latter to bring forth grass, and herb, and tree, and (hen had 
placed his sun in the former, that by constant irradiations of 
light and heat from that central fountain, the life,^ and motion, 
which the first mover had begun by the incubation of his 
Spirit, and which now manifested itself in the vegetable king- 
dom, might be maintained till it had run its destined course. 
When all things were thus prepared, his next care was to 
people and enliven the earth with a different and higher class 
of beings, in whom — to organization, and life, and growth, 
and reproductive powers, — might be added sensation and vol- 
untary motion. Unpeopled by animals, the verdant earth in 
all its primitive and untarnished beauty, though inlaid with 
flowers exhibiting, in endless variety, every mixture and shade 
of colour that can glad the sight; though fanned by gales 
breathing Sabean odours, to gratify the scent; though tempt- 
ing the appetite by delicious fruits of every flavour, still would 
be a scene without the breath of life. No motions would be 
seen but of the passing clouds, of the fluctuating waters, and 
the waving boughs; no voice heard but of the elements. 

Was a single pair placed in this paradise, though at first it 
would seem that there was gratification for every sense, and 
joy would possess the heart, and admiration fill the soul with 
pleasure; yet after the novelty of the spectacle had ceased, and 
the effect of its first impression was obliterated,'a void would soon 
be felt, something more would seem wanting to animate the 
otherwise lovely scene; a longing would arise in the mind for 
some beings, varying in form and magnitude, furnished with 
organs that would enable them to traverse and enliven the 
lower regions of the atmosphere, others that might course over 
the earth's surface, and others that could win their easy way 
through its waters, so that all, by their numbers, and the variety 
of their motions, might exhibit a striking and interesting con- 
trast to the fixed and unconscious vitality of the vegetable 
kingdom. 

But it was not the will of the beneficent Creator to leave 
such a blank and blot in his creation; before he created man 
in his own image, and enthroned him king of the new-made 
world, he decreed that his dominion also should be an image 
of his own, over innumerable creatures of every form and 
grade, each in its place entrusted with a peculiar ofiice and 
function, and furnished with organs adapted to its work, con- 
tributing to its own and the general welfare; so that all should 

I See Appendix, note 1. 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. 3 

operate, "though each in different sort and manner," to accom- 
plish the great plan of an All-wise Providence. 

What was the precise order of creation in the animal king- 
dom is no where clearly revealed in Holy Scripture ; and we 
can only conjecture, since the most perfect animal, and he 
who alone belonged to the spiritual and invisible world by his 
soul, as well as by his body to the visible, was created the last, 
that the progress was from those that were at the foot of the 
scale to those that were at the summit. We are told, indeed, 
in general terms, that on the fifth day, at the divine bidding, 
the waters, hitherto barren and untenanted, produced abun- 
dantly "f/ie moving creature that hath life" and fowl to traverse 
the firmament. In an instant, in obedience to that quicken- 
ing word, by the operation of Almighty Power, and under the 
guidance of infinite Wisdom and Goodness, the boundless ocean 
with all its tributary streams became prolific, and brought 
forth by myriads, in endless and strange diversity, its destined 
offspring, beginning, perhaps, with the viewless animalcule or 
the senseless polype, half animal and half plant, and ending 
with the half fish and half quadruped, cetaceans, and their 
kindred monsters.^ Nor was the Ocean prolific of aquatic 
animals alone, and those whose habitation was the restless 
world of waters, with all its streams, its caves, and its abysses, 
it also gave birth to all the winged and feathered tribes — from 
the brilliant hunaming bird to the mighty eagle and the giant 
vulture — that people and enliven the atmospheric sea, and 
make it the field of their excursions. The animals created on 
this day were destined to dwell or move, independent of the 
earth, in a fluid medium of greater or less tenuity, and for that 
purpose were fitted with appropriate and peculiar organs, in 
one case both for respiration and locomotion, in the other for 
locomotion only. 

Again the word of power was spoken, — "Lei the earth bring 
forth," and instantly the various tribes of quadrupeds issued 
from her teeming womb, varying infinitely in size, from the 
minute harvest-mouse^ to the giant bulk of the elephant and 
hippopotamus; then also the earth-born reptiles, whether four- 
footed, six-footed, eight-footed, or many-footed, started into 
life, and connected the terrestrial tribes with those produced 
from the waters. In the majority of these, the fins of the 
fishes and cetaceans, and the wings of the birds, were replaced 
by legs best fitted for motion on the theatre on which they 
were to act their part, and to fulfil the will of their Creator. 

I See Appendix, note 2. 2 Mus messorijus. 



4 CREATION OP ANIMALS. 

The earth was now completely furnished and decorated to 
receive her destined king and master. The sun, the moon, 
and the stars were shedding their kindly influences upon her; 
she and her fellow planets had commenced their annual and 
diurnal revolutions; the plants and flowers, her first born pro- 
geny, had sprung out of her bosom, and covered her with ver- 
dure and beauty; and the fruit, and forest trees flourishing in 
all their glory of leaf, blossom, and fruit, were ready to minister 
to the support, comfort, and enjoyment of their future lord : 
the sea, the air, the earth, were each filled with their appro- 
priate inhabitants, and throughout the whole creation was 
beauty, and grace, and life, and motion, and joy, and jubilee. 
But still, in the midst of all this apparent glory and activity 
of vegetable and animal life in the new created world, there 
was not a single being endued with reason and understand- 
ing; one that could elevate its thought above ihe glorious and 
wonderful spectacle to the great Author of it, or acknowledge 
and adore its Creator. Amidst this infinite variety of beings 
there was not a single one which to a material body added an 
immaterial immortal soul ; so that there was still a great blank 
in creation. A wonderful and magnificent temple was reared, 
and shone in glory and beauty, but there was as yet no priest 
therein to offer up incense to the Deity to whom it was dedi- 
cated. 

We are now, therefore, to consider the creation of him for 
whom this high oflSce was reserved, who, as king and priest, 
was to render to the common Creator the praises due from all 
created things, and be the spokesman for all the inhabitants 
of this terrestrial globe. 

The vast distance, on this account, intervening between 
man and the highest animals in the scale of being, appears 
evident from the different circumstances attending their crea- 
tion. When they were brought into existence, the word was 
— " Let the waters bring forth — Let the earth bring forth^^^ from 
which it should seem that God did not act immediately in their 
creation, except by his agency on those powers that he had 
established as rulers in nature, and by which he ordinarily 
takelh hold, as it were, of the material universe. But when 
a being, combining the spiritual with the material world, is to 
be created, all the persons of the Godhead unite immediately in 
the work, and without the intervention of any other agent, 
"Lc^ us make man.''^ He was therefore neither sea-born nor 
earth-born, as some ancient nations claimed to be, but born of 
God ; though, as Christ moistened clay when he was about to 



CREATION OP ANIMALS. O 

exercise his creative power, in the re-forming of an eye ;^ so 
was the humid earth used in the creation of the body of man 
by his Maker, and when that wonderful machine, with its 
complex apparatus of organs, both external and internal, was 
finished ; when a throne and presence chamber were prepared 
for the intellectual and spiritual, and governing part of his na- 
ture, and that wonder-working pulp tlie brain, witli its silver 
spinal cord and infinitely divaricated threads, already fitted for the 
mastery of every motive organ, was in a state to transmit with- 
out obstruction, each flux and reflux of that subtile fluid, in- 
termediate, as it were, between matter and spirit,^ which so 
instantaneously conveys and causes tlie execution of the com- 
mands of the will by every external bodily organ ; when the 
heart wa^ ready to beat ; the lungs to play ; the blood to cir- 
culate ; and every other system to start for the fulfilment of its 
prescribed errand. " Then the Lord God breathed into his nostrils 
the breath of lives, and man became a living souV^ He was now 
installed into his kingdom over the globe which he inhabited, 
and dominion was given him over the inhabitants of the water, 
of the air, and of the earth; and the divine image, in which 
he was to be created, was rendered complete. 

Now, the generations of the world were perfect and health- 
ful, and God saw every thing that he had made, and behold 
it was very good. That is, — every individual essence, whether 
inanimate or animate, was fitted in every respect to answer 
the end of its creation, and perform its allotted part in contri- 
buting to the general welfare. The entire machine was now 
in action, every separate wheel w^as revolving, and the will of 
Him who contrived and fabricated it had full and uninterrupted 
accomplishment. The instincts of the whole circle of animals 
urged them, by an irresistible impulse, to fulfil their several 
functions ; I mean those that were necessary to the then state 
of things : for if the instinct of the predaceous ones was not 
restrained, they would soon have annihilated the herbivorous 
ones, even if, as Lightfoot supposes, they were at first created 
by sevens.'* They must, therefore, originally have eaten grass 
or straw like the ox, and neither injured nor destroyed their 
fellow-beasts of a more harmless character ; this, indeed, ap- 
pears clearly from the terms of the original grant, " To every 
beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing 
that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given 
every green herb for meat.'''* And to this vegetable diet, before 

1 John, ix. G. 2 See Appendix, note 3. 

3 See Appendix, note 4. 



b CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

the close of the present scene, we are assured they shall again 
return so as to render the last age of the world as happy as 
the original state of man in Paradise/ This harmony of the 
animal creation, continued probably long enough, after the 
fall, to allow sufficient time for such a multiplication of the 
flocks and herds, and flights and shoals of the gregarious ani- 
mals, as would secure them from extinction — but then, as the 
poet sings : 



Discord first 



Daughter of sin, among th' irrational 
Death introduced through fierce antipathy : 
Beast now with beast 'gan war, and fowl with fowl, 
And fish with fish; to graze the herd all leaving, 
Devoured each other ; nor stood much in awe 
Of man but fled him, or with countenance grim 
Glared on him passing. These were from without 
The growing miseries which Adam saw. 
t 

Had Adam not fallen, this sad change would, probably, never 
have taken place, for as the author of the book of wisdom 
argues : — " God made not deaths neither hath he pleasure in the 
destruction of the living. For he created all things that they might 
have their being ; and the generations of the world were healthful : 
and there is no poison of destruction in them, nor the kingdom of 
death upon the earth.'^^ When we consider the relative position 
of man and the animal kingdom, by the divine decree, sub- 
jected to his dominion, the harmony and good will that subsisted 
between them, it appears improbable that immortal man would 
have been afflicted by the appearance of death and destruction 
amongst his subjects from any cause, especially by the strong, 
and those armed with deadly weapons, attacking and devour- 
ing the weak and helpless. Even now, fallen as we are from 
our original dignity, there is no creature so fell and savage 
that we have not more or less the power to subdue and tame ; 
no natures so averse, that we are not skilled to reconcile ; we 
can counteract even instinct itself, and make a treaty of peace 
and mutual good will between animals, whom nature, by a 
law, has placed in the fiercest enmity and opposition to each 
other.^ 

The Creator, indeed, foreseeing the fatal apostacy that 
plunged our race in ruin, and providing for the circumstances 
in wliich our globe would eventually be placed from the too 
rapid increase of various animals most given to multiply, fur- 

1 Isaiah, Ixv. 25. 2 See Appendix, note 5. 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. 7 

nished the predatory tribes with organs and oifensive arms, 
which, when he gave the word and let loose the reins, would 
urge them to the work of destruction, and impel them to at- 
tack and devour without pity, those amongst the weaker ani- 
mals, that were likely to increase in a degree hurtful to the 
general welfare, thus fulfilling his great purpose of generally 
maintaining those relative proportions, as to number, of indi- 
vidual species, that would be most conducive to the health 
and mutual advantage of all parts of the system of our globe. 

This too is the place to consider another circumstance con- 
nected with the appointment by Providence of certain animals 
to certain ends. There are, as must be evident to every one 
who thinks or observes at all, large numbers of the animal 
kingdom, which, considered in their individual capacities, may 
be regarded as positively injurious to man ; and seem to have 
been created with a view to h\s punishment, either in his person 
or property. Of this description are those predatory tribes of 
which I have just spoken : but I here mean, more particularly, 
to advert to those personal pests, that not only attempt to derive 
their nutriment from him by occasionally sucking his blood 
when he comes in their way, as the flea, the horse-fly, and 
others, but those that make a settlement upon him or within 
him, selecting his body for their dwelling as well as their food, 
and thus infesting him with a double torment. 

Besides those insects of a disreputable name^ which, under 
more than one form, inhabit his person externally ; and those 
that, burying themselves in his flesh, annoy him and produce 
cutaneous diseases,^ a whole host of others attack him inter- 
nally, and sometimes fatally. Can we believe that man, in 
his pristine state of glory, and beauty, and dignity, could be 
the receptacle and the prey of these unclean and disgusting 
creatures'? This is surely altogether incredible, I had almost 
said impossible. And we must either believe, with Le Clerc 
and Bonnet, that all those worms now infesting our intestines 
existed in Adam before his fall, only under the form of eggs, 
which did not hatch till after that sad event: or that these 
eggs were dispersed in the air, in the water, and in various 
aliments, and so were ready to hatch when they met with 
their destined habitation : or, as some parasites are found in 
the earth,^ or the water,* as well as in the human species, that 

1 Pediculi. 2 Sarcoptes Scabiei, Pulcz penetrans, ^t. 

3 Lumbricus. 4 Gordius aquaticus. 



8 CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

they are in general formed for living in different stations :* or, 
lastly, that they were created subsequently to the fall of Adam, 
not immediately or all at once, but when occasions called for 
such expressions of the divine displeasure. 

With respect to the, first of these hypotheses, it seems to me 
very improbable for this reason, that it supposes the first pair 
to have in them the germs of all these animal pests, which 
although, before the fall, they were restrained from germina- 
tion, after that event, were left to the ordinary action of phy- 
sical laws, so that then every one of these scourges must have 
inhabited them and preyed upon them. Fallen indeed they 
were from glory and grace, but who can think that all the 
accumulated evils that their sin introduced into the world fell 
with concentrated violence upon their own heads, that all the 
various ills that flesh is heir to were experienced by them in 
their own persons before they were divided, some to one and 
some to another, amongst their posterity 1 It is scarcely to be 
supposed that any single individual, from that time to this, 
was subject to the annoyance of every one of these animals, 
and it seems incredible that Adam and Eve had experience of 
them all. 

That they had their existence originally either as germs or 
as perfect animals in the air, the earth, or the waters, and were 
taken in by man with his food, with respect to some species 
may, perhaps, be true. The earth-worm is often voided by 
children, and some other that infest animals are found in the 
water, but of those that are appropriated to man internally, 
none have as yet been found, except that just mentioned, in 
any other habitation. Linne indeed assigns an aquatic origin 
to the fluke, the ascarides, and the tape-worm, but he seems 
to have adopted this opinion upon very slight grounds. Bon- 
net very justly asks, with respect to the last of these animals, 
which Linne states he found once in a kind of ochre. "M. 
Linne is the only one that has made this discovery, now it is 
certain that if tape-worms existed out of the body of man and 
other animals, would it be possible, after the numerous re- 
searches that naturalists of every country have made in a va- 
riety of places, both in the earth and the water, none should 
ever meet with that insect?"^ All Helminthologists seem 
now to be of opinion that the sole natural habitation of these 
animals is that in which they are usually found, the human 
viscera. 

Wc now come to the last hypothesis, that these animals 

1 See Introd. to Ent. iv. 229. 2 (Euvr. iii. 138. 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. W 

were created subsequently to the fall : a single instance from 
Scripture of such a creation will be sufficient to render it pro- 
bable that others may have taken place when occasions called 
for such expressions of Divine displeasure. Every one is aware 
that God by the wonder-working rod of Moses converted all 
the dust of Egypt into some punitive animal or genus of ani- 
mals, for they attacked man and beast, concerning the kind of 
which interpreters differ ;^ but this does not affect the question, 
it is evident that here is an instance of the creation of an ani- 
mal in great numbers, and what is worthy of particular obser- 
vation, that this animal was not afterwards again annihilated 
as the frogs, and others were. What has evidently been done 
once under circumstances that required it, though not recorded, 
may have been repeated, and thus all the punitive species in 
question may have been produced. 

This is given merely as an hypothesis, to account for the 
existence of these animals, without doing violence to proba^ 
bihty ; and rather in accordance with the word of God, than 
controverting any thing delivered therein — and if it excites a 
discussion that may throw new light upon the subject, which 
ever way the question is deterrhined, I shall be well pleased — 
my object being rather to elicit truth, than to uphold opinion. 

Another inquiry also suggests itself with respect to the ori- 
ginal animal creation. Are any of those animals with which 
God peopled the earth, air, and waters, preparatory to the 
creation of man, now extinct ? The answer to this question 
will principally depend upon that to another. Did any altera- 
tion take place in the climate and productions of our globe in 
consequence of the fall of man from his original state? We 
learn from the inspired penman, that God, induced by that 
sad event, pronounced a curse upon the ground, and predicted 
that it should produce in abundance noxious plants for the 
annoyance of the offending race of man, and that whereas the 
primeval earth brought forth spontaneously her fruits and 
flowers, and afforded man a pleasant and delightful recreation 
and employment, without subjecting him to toil and weari- 
ness ; this state of things should cease, and man, for the future, 
should earn his bread with difficulty by the labour of his hands 
and the sweat of his brows. From hence it seems to follow 
that at this time some great change took place, both with re- 
spect to climate, and to tliat blessing from atmospheric influ- 
ences which produces plenty and fertility with the lowest 

1 See Appendix, note 6. 



10 CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

amount of labour. Geologists have observed, from the remains 
of plants and animals embedded in the strata of this and other 
northern countries, that the climate must formerly have been 
warmer than it now is/ Some change or changes of this 
kind therefore would sooner or later produce the extinction of 
such animals and plants, inhabitants of northen countries, as 
could not bear such a change of temperature, and at the same 
time could not escape from it ; and admitting this — it would 
enable us to answer in the affirmative to the query above stated 
— namely, that there were species of animals originally created 
which have since ceased to exist. Being no longer necessary 
to bear a part in carrying on the general plan of Divine Provi- 
dence with regard to our globe, they were permitted or caused 
to perish. 

One circumstance, which I have not seen adverted to, 
seems to confirm this hypothesis: that so few fossil remains, 
if any, of tropical birds have hitherto been discovered in cold 
countries, while such numbers of the quadrupeds of warm cli- 
mates, both viviparous and oviparous, are met with every day 
in a fossil state. Now the birds could readily shift their quar- 
ters southwards, when the temperature grew too cold for them, 
while the quadrupeds might be stopped by seas, rivers, and 
other obstacles. 

Another question may be asked with respect to the subject 
I am discussing ; might not the animals now become superflu- 
ous have been excluded from the ark at the time of the gen- 
eral deluge, and so left to perish ? This would furnish a very 
easy solution of the difficulty, but the text of Scripture seems 
too precise and express to allow of such a supposition. For 
the command to Noah is — " Of every living thing of all flesh, two 
of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark." But yet the terms 
here employed must be limited to those animals that required 
such shelter to preserve them from destruction by tbe diluvial 
waters ; so that the expression — ^^ of all flcsK'' — necessarily ad- 
mits of some exceptions. 

But there are doubtless very many animals still existing upon 
the earth and in its waters, that have not yet been discovered. 
When we consider the vast tracks of terra incognita still shut 
out from us in the heart of Africa, that fotal country hitberto 
as it were hermetically sealed to our researches, and from 
whose bourne so few travellers return ; how little we know of 
Central Asia, of Ciiina, and of some parts of Nortli America ; 
we may well believe that our catalogues of animals are still 

1 See Appendix, note 7. 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. 11 

very short, of (heir real numb-ers, even with respect lo those of 
the largest dimensions. Burchell and Campbell appear to 
have met with more than one new species of rhinoceros in 
their journey from the Cape of Good Hope into the interior;^ 
the same country may conceal others of the same gigantic or 
other tribes, which, when it is more fully explored, may hear- 
after be brought to light. 

Again, with regard to the productions of the various seas 
and oceans that occupy so large a portion of our globe, we 
know comparatively few, especially of its molluscous inhabi- 
tants. What are cast up on the shores of the various countries 
washed by their waves, and what the net or other means maj^ 
collect in their vicinity, find their way indeed into our cabinets ; 
but what are these compared with such as inhabit the depths 
and caves and bed of the infinite ocean, which net never 
dragged, nor plumb-line fathomed. Who shall say what 
species lurk in those unapproachable recesses never to be re- 
vealed to the eye of man, but in a fossil state. The giant 
Inocerami, the singular tribe of Ammonites, and all their cognate 
genera, as even Lamarck seems disposed to concede :^ the Ba- 
culites, Hamites, Scaphites, and numerous others there have 
space enough to live unknown to fame, while the}^ are reck- 
oned by the geologist as expunged from the list of living ani- 
mals. I do not mean to assert that these creatures are not 
extinct, but I would only caution the student of nature from 
assuming this as irrefragably demonstrated ; since we certainly 
do not yet know enough of the vast field of creation, to say 
dogmatically with respect to any species of these animals that 
this is no longer in being. 

But besides the unexplored parts of the surface of the earth, 
and of the bed of the ocean, are we sure that there is no re- 
ceptacle for animal life in its womb ? I am not going here to 
revive the visionary speculations of Athanasius Kircher in his 
Mundus subterraneus, but merely to inquire whether there are 
any probable grounds for thinking that some creatures may be 
placed by their Creator at such a depth within the earth's 
crust, as to be beyond all human ken. 

When Laplace says, "It is certain that the densities of its 
{the earth's) strata increase from the surface to the centre," it 
seems to follow that, in his opinion, there is no central cavity 
in our globe ; but as his object was chiefly to assert the in- 
creasing density of the strata as they approach the centre, per- 
haps his words are not to be taken strictly, especially as in 

1 See Appendix, note 8. 2 In N. D. D. H. N. vii. 553. 



12 CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

another place he speaks of it merely as probable that the strata 
are more dense as they are nearer to the centre. Sir I. F. W. 
Herschel makes a similar, but less exclusive observation, using 
the terms, ^Howards the centre," which is not inconsistent with 
a cavity. 

But after all this is matter of conjecture built upon the at- 
traction of the earth, and cannot be ascertained by actual ex- 
amination ; as far as that has been carried, it does not appear 
that in the present state of our globe the strata always lie 
exactly in the order of their densities ; in the original earth 
probably they did. But now we tread upon the ruins of a 
world that has been almost destroyed and reformed. " The 
structure of the globe," observes an eminent geographer, 
" presents in all its parts the features of a grand ruin ; the 
confusion and overthrow of most of its strata, the irregular 
succession of those which seem to remain in their original 
situations, the wonderful variety which the direction of the 
veins and the forms of the caverns display, the immense heaps 
of confused and broken substances, the transportation of enor- 
mous blocks to a great distance from the mountains of which 
they appear to have formed a part,"^ — do not lead us as he 
would intimate " to periods far anterior to the existence of the 
human race," but to a mighty catastrophe by which the whole 
structure of our globe has been dislocated, and its ancient 
strata broken up, and separated by the intervention of new 
ones formed of animal and vegetable remains. 

When the Almighty formed our globe from the original 
chaos, and projecting it into space bade it perform its diurnal 
and annual revolutions, he first weighed it in his balance, 
and moulded it so as it might answer to the action of those 
mighty powers by whose constant impulse or impact those re- 
volutions were to be maintained ; and if a central void was 
necessary he wanted not the means to produce and maintain 
it. When the power called attraction tended to drive all to 
the centre, the repellant principle might be so stationed as to 
counteract it, and keep the earth's crust at its assigned dis- 
tance. To compare great things with small, he who made 
the rain-drop made also the air-bubble, — the one to fall, the 
other to rise. 

The word of God, in many places, speaks' of an abyss of 
waters under the earth, as distinct from the ocean though in 
communication with it," and also as contributing to form springs 

1 Maltc-Brun Syst. of Gcogr. L. i. 192. 

2 Comp. Job, xxviii. 14, xxxviii. 10, 17.— Genes, vlix. 'i,').— Dout. xxxiii. 
13. — Jonah, ii. 6, &c. 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. 13 

and rivers.* Scientific men, in the present day, appear dis- 
posed to question this ; the Geologist, though he may regard 
the granitic strata as forming the base, as it were, of the crust 
of the earth, seems rather to view it as containing a focus of 
heat, than a magazine of infinite waters; from whence are 
partly derived the springs and rivers that water the earth's 
surface, and ultimately make good to the ocean its whole loss 
by evaporation.^ " Springs," says the author above quoted, 
"are so many little reservoirs, which receive their waters from 
the neighbouring ground, through small lateral channels." 
He allows, however, ihat the origin of springs cannot be re- 
ferred to one exclusive cause, and associates with that just 
mentioned, the precipitation of atmospheric vapours attracted 
by high lands, the dissolving of ice, the filtering of sea-waters, 
and the explosion of subterraneous vapours. He makes no 
direct mention of a store-house of waters in the bosom of the 
earth as in any case the source of springs and rivers, but al- 
lows that " the phenomena of capillary tubes may obtain in its 
interior. The sea-waters, deprived of their salt and bitter ele- 
ments, may ascend through the imperceptible pores of several 
rocks, from which, being disengaged by the heat, they will 
form those subterraneous vapours to which many springs owe 
their origin." A very sHght alteration of this passage would 
make it harmonize with the Scripture account of the matter. 
If, for "some rocks," we substitute* through the rocky strata, 
and to the " sea-waters" add received into the abyss, it would 
amount to nearly the same thing. It was an ancient opinion, 
mentioned in Plato's Phaedon, that there is a flux and reflux 
of the waters of our globe, a kind of systole and diastole, into 
and from Tartarus or the great abyss, which produce seas, 
lakes, rivers, and fountains.^ That all the causes mentioned 
above contribute to the formation of the rivers that water the 
earth, especially the clouds and vapours that gather round the 
tops of the mountains and high hills I am ready to admit, at 
the same time I must contend that the principle reservoir from 
which they are supplied has its station under the earth. 

Writers on this subject seem to speak as if the source of all 
rivers was in mountainous or hilly countries, but though the 
mightiest rivers of the globe originate in such situations, there 
is a very large number of considerable streams whose source 
is not particularly elevated, especially in the flat parts of Eng- 
land ; and there are few rivers that do not receive some supply 

1 Ps. Ixxviii. 15, 16. — Prov. viii. 24. 2 See Appendix, note 9. 

3 Platonis Dialogi. Ed. Forst. Plmdon. § ^. 



14 CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

from lesser ones, having their rise in low grounds, in their 
course. The practice, in- all countries, of digging wells indi- 
cates a downward source of water. 

In the Mosaic account of the deluge it is stated, that the 
waters prevailed above the tops of all the mountains fifteen 
cubits — now the highest mountain in the globe, Dhawalagiri, 
a peak of the Himmaleh range in northern India, is five miles 
above the level of the sea, this will make a sphere of waters, 
inclosing the whole globe as its nucleus, of five miles in depth 
above the level of the sea, but in calculating the immense ad- 
ditional body of water thus burying the whole globe, deductions 
must be made for the mountains and the lands elevated above 
that level, which would considerably decrease the total amount. 
But, even then, how vast would be the increase. If two-fifths 
of this body were deducted, a deluge of rain for forty days and 
forty nights over the whole globe, would fall infinitely short of 
the amount of water required to cover it to this height. The 
mean quantity of rain that now falls upon theeaith in the course 
of a whole year is short of three feet ; there must therefore 
have been an outbreak of waters from a source which could 
supply all that was necessary to accomplish the will of the 
Almighty, and make the earth itself a ruin, as well as sweep 
off its inhabitants ; and where shall we look for this but to the 
abyss that coucheth beneath the earth, whose fountains, as the 
sacred historian tells us, were broken up. If we consider the 
diameter of our globe, and that the ocean in depth is not sup- 
posed to exceed the highest mountains, we may conceive that 
in a spheroid, whose diameter is 8000 miles, allowing for the 
depth of the crust of the earth, there is space for a treasure- 
house of water, of sufficient amplitude to supply what the hea- 
vens could not furnish, to raise the diluvial waters to the height 
decreed in the Divine counsels. It seems now agreed amongst 
geologists and mineralogists that traces of the action of fire, as 
well as water, are very visible amongst the present strata of 
this globe : when the waters of the abyss were sent out from 
their hidden receptacle, it must be by the agency of some po- 
tent cause employed by the Deity, equal to the production of 
the effect he intended. 

In the present state of the globe, volcanoes, or their traces 
are visible in various regions in all chmates, and in the islands 
of various seas, and in Iceland, near Hccla, the subterranean 
furnace sends vast columns of water into the air, sometimes to 
the height of a hundred feet, and at the base of half that dia- 
meter.* These circumstances render it probable that fire was 

1 Sec Hooker's Recollections ul' Iceland, 120. 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. 15 

the agent, or one of the agents, employed to send out the wa- 
ters from the abyss ; and this is no new hypothesis. " It is the 
opinion of geologists," says Laplace, " that, originally, there 
existed in the interior of the crust of the earth, a great maga- 
zine of fire, which according to them was the cause of the 
deluge." Some writers suppose that the air was driven down- 
wards into the earth, being forced through those chasms which 
opened towards the sky, and that then by its expansion it drove 
out the waters.^ 

He who willed the deluge, and the destruction of the pri- 
meval earth and heavens by it,^ kept in his own hands the 
reins, and guided the whole body of means that he employed 
to fulfil the great purposes of his Providence, saying to every 
agent, " Thus far shall thou go, and no further.'''^ It must al- 
ways be kept in mind that this was not an event in the ordi- 
nary course of nature, and a result of the enforcement of her 
established code of law-s, but a miraculous deviation from it, 
in which their action was suspended, and in consequence of 
which, perhaps, some were abrogated and new ones enacted 
in their room. I may here further observe, that probably, the 
whole body of waters which before the creation of the firma- 
ment or expanse, with the earthly atoms suspended in it, 
formed the primeval chaos, w^ere now again its masters ; de- 
scending and ascending from every receptacle or store-house to 
which that powerful expansion had been the means employed 
to guide them. Whatever waters were suspended in the at- 
mosphere, or could be formed in it, whatever were contained 
in the ocean, or the womb of our globe, now united their forces 
and subdued and destroyed the primitive earth, till they re- 
duced it to the state, for the most part, in which we now be- 
hold it. 

I am next to inquire what has been said in Scripture on the 
subject of subtj^rranean animals. In the second command- 
ment we are forbidden to ^^make any likeness of any thing that 
is in the luaters under the earth." These words, however, may 
be merely used to indicate the animals that inhabit the ocean, 
considering the waters under the earth as forming a part of it. 
But there is a passage in the Apocalypse, where the creatures 
under the earth are distinguised from those in the sea. ^^And 
every creature ivhich is in heaven and on the earth, and under the 
earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard 
I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory and power, be unto him 

1 Rev. W. Jones's IVorks, x. 2(54. 

2 Pet. iii. G, 7, and see Appendix, note 10 



16 CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever."* 
Some interpreters understand this passage as relating to those 
men that were buried under the earth, or in the sea, but ad- 
mitting they were meant in the spirit, the creatures in general 
are expressed in the letter, and therefore the outward symbol 
must have a real existence, as well as what it symbolized. 

There is another place in Scripture, which though highly 
metaphorical, seems to me, to point, if rightly interpreted, at 
subterranean animals, and even a particular description of 
them. The passage I allude to is in the xlivth Psalm, 
" Though thou hast sore broken us in the place of dragons and 
covered us with the shadow of death."^ In these words the place 
of dragons and the shadow of death evidently mean the same 
thing ; and the object of these metaphors is to express the 
lowest degree of affliction, depression, and degradation ; equi- 
valent to being brought down to hell or hades in other pas- 
sages. The shadow of death, properly speaking, is in the 
hidden or subterranean world. This appears from the passage 
of Job before quoted, in which the abyss the gates of death, and 
the gates of the shadow of death, are used as synonymous ex- 
pressions.^ The place of dragons, then, according to this ex- 
position, will be subterranean. In another Psalm, David 
couples dragons and abysses.'^ 

We must next inquire what is meant by the word dragons. 
The Hebrew word usually thus translated, but in some places 
rendered whales and sea-monsters, and in others serpents,^ is 
derived from a root, which signifies to wail or lament ; proba- 
bly, alluding to the noise at certain times emitted by those 
animals, that are more properly regarded as dragons, by which 
I would understand the Saurian race, without excluding the 
others, which are sometimes certainly intended by that word. 
Thus, when Jeremiah alludes, under the name dragons, to 
animals that give suck to their young, it is clear that he meant 
some of the whale or seal kind, which are mammiferous. Our 
translators, therefore, very properly rendered the word sea- 
monsters, or as in the margin, sea-calves. I may here observe, 
though at first sight, the crocodile and the whale seem widely 
separated from each other, that theie are certain species, at 
present found only in a fossil state, and fitted with paddles in- 
stead of legs, which are stated to combine characters observable 
in the Cetaceans with those of the Saurians, particularly tljc 

I llevc-l. V. in. ti I's. xliv. 11). 

:{ Job, x.wviii. 10, 17. 1 Ts. cvlviii. 7 

o GciK's. i. 21. Laiuuul. IV. 3. Exod. vi. 0, 10 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. 17 

Plesiosmrus ;^ the Testudo also of the Greeks'^ seems to ap- 
proach some of the seals. The word we are considering, in 
the first chapter of Genesis, is rendered by our translators, 
whales. In the version of the seventy, a word is used,^ whicli 
the Greek writers employ to signify any aquatic monster ; 
thus, Theocritus, when he describes the Nile as abounding in 
monsters, means the crocodile. Our Saviour, when he speaks 
of Jonah in the belly of the fish, uses the same word, probably, 
for a shark, the dog Carcharias of the Greeks, which was fa- 
bled to have swallowed Hercules, a fable, no doubt, derived 
from the history of Jonah. 

It appears clearly that the word is also used for a serpent, 
for it is employed to express the animal into which the rod of 
Moses and those of the Egyptian magicians were transformed 
as related in the book of Exodus. 

The typical animal, however, if I may so employ that term, 
or the dragon proper of Scripture, is undoubtedly a Saurian, 
especially the amphibious ones, such as the crocodile and its 
affinities. In the Septuagint version the Hebrew word is some- 
times rendered by the terra Siren, which in other places is 
used for the ostrich,* derived from a root which relates to its 
noise, but the Siren of the Greeks is very different from that 
of these Jews — the former being a fabulous, the latter a real 
animal. Travellers describe the noises of crocodiles and alli- 
gators as horrible. Crocodiles, during the whole summer, 
says Bosc, but especially immediately after they emerge from 
the earth, that is in the spring and the epoch of their amours, 
frequently send forth lowings almost as loud as those of an ox. 
They respond to each other often by hundreds, especially in 
the evening, which makes in the swampy forest a frightful 
and thundering din. Captain Jobson says, that those of the 
river Gambia utter cries that may be heard from a great dis- 
tance, which seem as if they issued from the ground. 

The whale also, when it expels the water, is related to make 
a frightful noise, like distant thunder. Captian Cook repre- 
sents the walrus, when in^ herds, as roaring or braying very 
loud, and some species of seals are stated to bellow like bulls. 

The hissing of serpents agrees less with the radical idea of 
the word dragon, than the noises of either of the preceding 
tribes of animals. The aquatic and amphibious Saurians oc- 
cupying, as it were, a middle station between the Cetaceans 

1 Mantell's Jlge of Reptiles.— Snssex Gazette. 

2 Sphargis coriacea. 3 ret iturH tot. fjnyuxa. 
4 Isai. xiii. 21.-- Job, xxx. 29, &c. 

C 



18 CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

and Ophidians, may be regarded, therefore, as the dragons par 
excellence. 

These, then, are the animals that I conjecture may not 
improbably be still in existence in the subterranean ocean ; I 
shall now, therefore, bring- forward some arguments, indepen- 
dent of what I have alleged from Holy Scripture, which seem 
to afford grounds for such an hypothesis. 

It has been calculated that the depth of the sea in any part 
does not exceed 30,000 feet, or a little more than five miles ; 
this, compared with the diameter of our globe, about 8000 
miles, may be regarded as nothing. What a vast space then, 
supposing it really hollow, may be contained in its womb, not 
only for an abundant reservoir of watei:s, but for sources of the 
volcanic action, which occasionally manifests itself in various 
parts, both of the ocean and terra firma. Reasoning from 
analogy, and from that part of the globe which falls under our 
inspection, it will appear not improbable that this vast space 
should not be altogether destitute of its pecuhar inhabitants. 
We know that there are numerous animals, on the surface of 
the globe, that conceal themselves in various places in the day 
time, and only make their appearance in the night. It would, 
therefore, be perfectly consistent with the general course of 
God's proceedings, and in exact harmony with the general 
features of creation, that he should have peopled the abyss 
with creatures fitted, by their organization and structure, to 
live there ; and it would not be wonderful that some of the 
Saurian race, especially the marine ones, should have their 
station in the subterranean waters, which would sufficiently 
account for their never having been seen except in a fossil 
state. 

The organization of many reptiles favours the idea of their 
being fitted for a subterranean habitation. It has been ob- 
served of them, that they not only perceive objects at a great 
distance, but are furnished with a nictitant membrane like 
birds; and that the greater part can contract the pupil like 
cats, which enables them to see in the dark. Their other or- 
gans furnish them with but few sensations : they conununicatc 
less frequently and less perfectly with external objects ; their 
blood is cold, and will circulate a long time without commu- 
nication with the air. They will bear very long fasts without 
injury ; and those of some tribes, (lie Chelonians at least, will 
survive for a time the loss of their brain, their heart, and even 
their head. These circumstances are found in those that only 
occasionally seek subterranean retreats, or seclusion from the 
light and the air ; but those whose existence is wholly subter- 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. 19 

ranean, doubtless, like the Proteus, would be fitted b)^ their 
organization for their destined abode. We see, in several of 
those we are acquainted with, except at certain times, a con- 
stant effort to escape not only from observation, but from im- 
mediate contact with the light and the air. 

This leads me further to observe, that there is one instance 
of a Saurian, at this time known to be in existence, that is 
perfectly subterranean, which never makes its appearance on 
the earth's surface, but is always concealed at a considerable 
depth below it ; and, what is worthy of particular notice, by 
its structure, is connected with one of the larger Saurians, now 
found only in a fossil state. It will immediately be perceived 
that I allude to that most extraordinary animal, the Proteus 
anguinuSf^ which is found in subterranean lakes and caves two 
or three hundred feet below the surface of the ground in Illyria, 
breathing both by lungs and gills, and presenting characters 
which connect it with the Saurian monsters before alluded 
to, whose remains have occasioned so much astonishment, ap- 
pear to have puzzled in some measure the most acute geolo- 
gists, and have given birth to an hypothesis I shall hereafter 
notice. Sir H. Davy, in his last singular work, thus expresses 
himself concerning the Proteus : — " My reveries became dis- 
cursive, I was carried, in imagination, back to the primitive 
state of the globe, when the great animals of the Sauri kind 
were created under the pressure of a heavy atmosphere ; and 
my notion on this subject was not destroyed, when I heard 
from a celebrated anatomist, to whom I sent the specimens I 
had collected, that the organization of the spine of the Proteus 
was analogous to that of one of the Sauri, the remains of which 
are found in the older secondary strata." Sir Humphry pro- 
bably here alludes to a celebrated fossil found in the slate 
quarries of (Eningen, which Scheuchzer called an ante-diluvian 
man, but which Cuvier regards as a giant species of Proteus. 

All the circumstances above stated being duly weighed, and 
especially the discovery of a species in the depths of the earth, 
related to one of the fossil ones, I trust that my hypothesis of 
a subterranean metropolis for the Saurian, and perhaps other 
reptiles, will not be deemed so improbable and startling as it 
may at the first blush appear ; at the same time, I would by 
no means be thought to contend that none of these animols are 
extinct, but solely that all may not be so, and that their never 
having been found in a recent slate may have arisen from the 
peculiar circumstances of their situation. 

1 Pr.ATK xiv, Fig. 1 



20 CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

I have been led into this discussion by Mr. Mantell's Hypo- 
thesis of an Age of Reptiles^ which I have seen only in an ex- 
tract from one of the Sussex advertisers for last year, which 
he was so kind as to send to me ; in which he supposes that the 
Saurians were the mighty masters, as well as monsters, of the 
primeval animal kingdom, and the lords of the creation before 
the existence of the human race. Since this hypothesis, as 
stated in the above extract, cannot be reconciled with the ac- 
count of the creation of animals as given in the first chapter of 
Genesis, I shall not be wandering from the purpose of the pre- 
sent essay if I devote a few pages to the consideration of it. 

The hypothesis in question is based by its learned promul- 
gator chiefly upon the supposed age of the beds a'nd strata in 
which the remains of these fossil Saurians generally have been 
found, which he states as more ancient than those which con- 
tain the remains of viviparous animals ; and upon the myriads 
which appear, when they were the lords of our glohe, to have 
existed. But it is clear from his own statement that with the 
fossil remains of the Megalosaurus, a giant lizard, calculated 
to have been forty feet in length and eight in height, those of 
some viviparous quadruped related to the Opossum have been 
found, which he acknowledges cannot be satisfactoriljiexplained. 
A fact that militates strongly against an insulated Saurian 
reign. Nor is it altogether true that the remains of these 
mighty lizards are found solely in what are denominated an- 
cient deposites ; vertebral joints are not unfrequently found in 
other situations. I have one between three and four inches 
in diameter, which, from its being cupped, or deeply concave 
at each extremity, evidently belongs to one of these animals, 
which was found in a gravel-pit, at no great depth, in my own 
neighbourhood ; and I have seen similar ones found in other 
parts of the county of Suffolk. These dispersed bones seem to 
indicate that the individuals to which they belonged were de- 
posited in situations more exposed to the action of the atmos- 
phere, so as to decompose the ligaments that kept the skeleton 
entire. The interment of these animals was therefore various, 
and evidently regulated by circumstances, so that no satisfac- 
tory hypothesis can be built upon it. When the whole globe 
was submerged, and the waters overtopped the highest moun- 
tains, the terrestrial animals would, in numberless cases, float 
upon the surface, and be deposited in countries far distant from 
those which they inhabited, while those that were aquatic, being 
in their native element, must have owed their death to other cir- 
cumstances ; ihcy nuist cither have been overwhelmed by some 
sudden force that they couhl not resist or escape iVom ; or some 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. 21 

cause that we cannot now appreciate may have overtaken and 
destroyed them. 

With regard to the numbers of these animals, which Mr. Man- 
tell thinks prove their prevalence, we can only judge of it by 
those that are found in a fossil state, and these, certainly, are 
sufficiently numerous ; but surely it cannot be safely affirmed 
that for one individual found in a fossil state thousands must 
have been devoured or decomposed. These mighty monsters 
were more likely to devour than to be devoured ; and even the 
herbivorous ones, such as the vast Iguanodon, supposed to be 
sometimes one hundred feet long and ten feet high ! would have 
puzzled the crocodiles and alligators and other carnivorous 
ones to overpower and dispatch them. 

But, in fact, the question is concerning those that were alive 
upon this globe at the time when the great convulsion took 
place that buried them. The skeletons of all that were placed 
under similar circumstances would be found in a similar state 
of preservation ; their flesh would be decomposed but not their 
skeleton ; the deluge would also interrupt all attacks of one 
animal upon another, every individual would be seeking to se- 
cure its own escape. But, setting aside these arguments u|)on 
the uncertain facts on which this hypothesis is built, if we turn 
our attention to the reason of the thing, who can think that a 
Being of unbounded power, wisdom, and goodness should create 
a world merely for the habitation of a race of monsters, with- 
out a single rational being in it to glorify and serve him. The 
supposition that these animals were a separate creation, inde- 
pendent of man, and occupying his eminent station and throne 
upon our globe long before he was brought into existence, in- 
terrupts the harmony between the different members of the ani- 
mal kingdom, and dislocates the beautiful and entire system, 
recorded with so much sublimity and majestic brevity in the 
first chapter of Genesis. 

How grand and at the same time how simple is this record, 
proceeding step by step from one Almighty operation to an- 
other ! each the natural consequence, as it were, of that which 
preceded it. When the earth was formed, and planted, and 
was receiving the influences of the sun and other luminaries, 
and thus was prepared to welcome and maintain her locomo- 
tive inhabitants, the perfect sphere of animals, if I may so 
speak, adapted to the wants of the primeval state of the globe 
of dry land and sea, both external and internal, and to the in- 
struction and uses of man, each individual form gifted and 
fitted to play the part assigned to it in the general plnn of 
Providence, was brought into existence. The supposed ex- 



32 CREATION OF ANIMALS. 

tinct animals all exhibit a relationship to those that we now 
find existing, and many of them evidently fill up vacant places 
in the general system, and therefore there js no cause to suppose 
that they were originally separated from and anterior to their 
fellows. It is observed that those herbivorous Saurians now 
inhabiting the surface of our globe, as the Jkfomfor and Iguana, 
though these can scarcely be called herbivorous since they hve 
principally on insects, are pigmies compared with their affinities, 
the Megalosaurus and Iguanodon; and a similar disproportion 
obtains between the existing Proteus and the fossil one. If any 
of these races are subterranean, perhaps these smaller ones may 
be regarded, as inhabiting the outskirts of the proper station, 
or metropolis of their tribe. 

It appears, I hope, from what has been observed, in the pre- 
sent chapter, on the subject of animals brought into being sub- 
sequent to the fall, and upon those that have since that sad 
event become extinct from whatever cause, that Divine Provi- 
dence, after the first creation of man and the animal kingdom, 
did not leave all things to the action of the original laws which 
ha4 received his awful sanction before the fall, but altered 
those by which this system, especially our own globe, was 
guided and governed before that fatal event, to suit them to 
what had taken place, and to the altered and deteriorated 
moral state of man. We learn from the Apostle Saint Peter, 
that the primeval globe and its heavens or atmosphere, perished 
at the deluge,* by which expression less cannot be intended, 
than that the atmosphere and the earth were then, as it were, 
new mixed, so as to render the former less friendly to life and 
health, whence would gradually follow the shortening of hu- 
man, and probably animal life ; and subject to raging storms 
and hurricanes ; to the fury and fearful effects of thunder and 
lightning ; to the overflowing violence of torrents of rain : while 
the latter, from the breaking up, inversion, mixing, depression, 
or elevation of its original strata, and the addition of new ones 
from animal and vegetable deposites,^ was rendered in many 
places utterly barren, and in others much diminished in fer- 
tility, so that the general productiveness of the globe must 
have been considerably diminished, and the permission to eat 
flesh must have been extremely useful in increasing the amount 
of food, and diminishing I hat of labour. Such a change hav- 
ing taken place, both in the heavens and the earth, and vast 
countries being essentially altered both in the temperature of 
the atmosphere, from whatever cause, and the productions of 

1 Gr. oLTruhtro. 2 Pet. iii. f). M Sec Appendix, note 11 



CREATION OF ANIMALS. 23 

the soil, the extinction of many of the original animal forms, 
that were extra-tropical, or at least were inhabitants of high 
latitudes, and were incapable of bearing the changes, whether 
it was ante-diluvial or post-diluvial, would necessarily follow ; 
and again as man was become by his nature prone to sin, he 
as necessarily was made subject to evil. Hence he became ex- 
posed, from the new constitution of the earth and atmosphere, 
to various diseases and sundry kinds of death, the term of his 
existence was shortened, and it was chequered with days of 
darkness as well as of light : and he was infested by various 
animals, either newly created, or then first let loose against 
him and his property. 

All these things indicate a change in the mechanical as 
well as other original powers set and kept in action by the 
Creator, and a certain dependence of two distinct classes of 
events upon each other. If a great alteration generally takes 
place in the moral condition of man, a corresponding change 
affects his physical one; and this alternation and conflict be- 
tween good and evil, in this double series, after a long and 
arduous struggle, will finally be determined by the destruction 
of this diluvial earth and heavens, which we are assured will, 
in the end, be replaced by "JVewj Heavens and a new Earth 
wherein dwelleth righteousness^^ 



CHAPTER 11. 

Geographical and Local Distribution of Animals. 

Having considered the first creation of the animal kingdom, 
and the larger features of its history to the time of the Deluge, 
bringing us to that era when our globe had assumed its pre- 
sent general characters, and its population was in those cir- 
cumstances that led to their present habits and stations: the 
next subject to be discussed is their geographical and local dis- 
tribution. 

What had taken place in this respect before the Deluge we 
have no means of ascertaining. That the original tempera- 
ture of the earth was once more equal than it is now, seems to 
be the general opinion of men of science, however they may 
differ as to its cause. ^ If this was the case, as it probably was, 
any individual species might have been located in any coun- 
try, north or south, and suffer no inconvenience from unaccus- 
tomed heat or cold, so as to interfere with its complete natu- 
ralization : the only other requisite would be a kind of food 
suited to its nature; and it is singular and worthy of particu- 
lar attention, that a large proportion of the plants, as well as 
animals, that are found in a fossil state in our northern lati- 
tudes are of a tropical type or character. 

After their creation, and perhaps the expulsion of the first 
pair from Paradise, we may suppose that the various animals 
of the ante-diluvian world were guided to those regions in \yhich 
it was the will of Providence to place them, by a divine im- 
pulse upon them, which caused them to move in the right 
direction. Probably before the Deluge took place, the world 
was every where peopled with animals : and perhaps, as Pro- 
fessor Buckland has suggested, the sudden change of tempe- 
rature that destroyed the northern animals might be one of the 
predisposing causes of that event. 

Under the piesent head, the geographical distribution of our 
post-diluvian races of animals, the first thing to be considered 

1 See above, p. 17, &.C. 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 25 

is the means by which, after quitting the ark, they were con- 
veyed to the other parts of the globe. The disembarkation of 
the venerable patriarch and his family, followed by all the ani- 
mals preserved with him in the aik, a scene of universal jubilee 
to man and beast, such as the world till that day had never 
witnessed, took place on Mount Ararat : the stream of inter- 
preters, ancient and modern, place this mountain in Armenia; 
but Shuckford, after Sir Walter Raleigh, seems to think that 
Ararat was further to the east, and belonged to the great range 
anciently called Caucasus and Imaus, which terminates in the 
Himmaleh mountains to the north of India. This opinion 
seems to receive some confirmation from Scripture, for it is 
said, " As they journeyed from the east, they found a plain in the 
land of Shinar^ Now the Armenian Ararat is to the north of 
Babylonia, whereas the Indian is to the east. Again, as the 
ark rested upon Ararat more than ten weeks before the tops of 
the mountains were seen, it seems to follow that it must have 
been a much higher mountain than the generality of those of 
the old world. The modern Ararat (Agri-Dagh) is not three 
miles above the level of the sea, whereas the highest peak of 
the Himmaleh range, Dhawalagiri, is five, and the highest 
mountain in the known w^orld : so that the tops of a great 
number of mountains would have appeared previously had the 
ark rested upon the former Ararat, but not so if upon the latter. 
The traditions also of various nations, given by Shuckford, 
add strength to this opinion. In addition to these, the follow- 
ing lines, quoted in a late article on Sanscrit poetry, in the 
Quarterly Review, show what was the creed in India on this 
subject: — 



In the whole world of creation 

None were seen but these seven sages, Menu and the fish; 

Years on years, and still unwearied, drew that fish the bark along, 

Till at length it came where reared Himavan — its loftiest peak ; 

There at length they came, and, smiling, thus the fish addressed the sage :■ — 

Bind thou now thy stately vessel to the peak of Himavan — 

At the fishes' mandate, quickly to the peak of Himavan : 

Bound the sage his bark, and even to this day that loftiest peak 

Bears the name of Naubandhana. 

Both these opinions have their difficulties, which I shall not 
further discuss, but leave the decision of the question to per- 
sons better qualified than myself to direct the public judgment: 
I shall only observe, that perhaps the Indian station was more 
central and convenient for the ready dispersion of men and 
animals than the Armenian one. Every naturalist is aware 

D 



26 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

that there are man}^ animals that, in a wild stale, are to be 
found only in particular countries and climates. Thus the 
Monkey and Parrot tribes usually inhabit a warm climate, the 
Bears and Gulls with many other Sea-birds, for the most part a 
cold one. The Kangaroo and Emu are only found in New 
Holland; the Lama in Peru; the Hippopotamus and Ostrich 
in Africa. Now we may ask, how were all these local animals 
conveyed from the place of disembarkation to the countries and 
climates that they severally inhabit ? In considering this 
question, we must never lose sight of Him, according to whose 
will, and by whose Almighty guidance, they were all led lo 
the stations he had appointed for them, and with reference to 
which he had organized and formed them. Whatever second 
causes he might commission to effect this purpose, they were 
fully instructed and empowered by him to accomplish tlie 
work intrusted to them. I do not mean here to infringe the 
rule, J^ec Deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus. Where the 
faculties, senses, and wants of an animal were sufficient for its 
guidance, there was no need for Divine interposition, but where 
these are insufficient guides, the animal must attain its des- 
tined station under some other influence. 

What brought the various animals to the ark previously (o 
the deluge? Doubtless a divine impulse upon them, similar to 
that which caused the milch-kine to carry the ark of the cove- 
nant to Bethshemesh, with the offerings of the lords of the 
PhiUstines. Noah, though he probably selected the clean 
animals, at least those that were domesticated, could have little 
or no influence over the wild ones to compel them to congre- 
gate by pairs, at the time fixed upon for their entry into the 
ark. So in the dispersion of animals, wherever man went he 
took his flocks and herds, and domestic poultry, and those in 
his employment for other purposes, with him: but the wild 
ones were left to follow as they would, or rather as God di- 
rected. 

Every one who looks at a map of (he world, on Mercalor's 
projection, can easily conceive how the animal population of 
the greatest part of the old world made their way into the dif- 
ferent countries of which it consists, but when he looks at 
America and New Holland, he feels himself unable satisfiicto- 
rily to explain the migration of animals thither, especially 
those that can live only in a warm climate, at least as far as 
regards the former. How, he might ask, did the Sloths, the 
Anteaters, and the Armadillos get to Soiuh America? If the 
climate of Behrings Straits, after the deluge, was as cold as it 
is at this day, tliey could never have made their way thither, 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 27 

and in (hose latitudes the temperature of which was adapted 
(o their organization the vast Pacific presents an insuperable 
barrier. 

The same question may be asked with respect to the indi- 
jS^enous animals of New Holland ; the Kangaroo, the Cola, the 
Ornithorh3nichus, the Emu, and several others that are found 
in no other country ; how did they, leaving the continent alto- 
gether, convey themselves to this their appointed abode] It 
is true difficulty is not so great in this last case, on account of 
the numerous islands interposed between Malacca, Cochin- 
china, &c. and the North Coast of New Holland, but then it 
is unaccountable, if the transit of these animals was gradually 
effected by natural causes, and following that of mankind from 
island to island, till they reached the country to which their 
range is now limited, that they should have left no remains of 
their race in the countries and islands which they must have 
traversed in their route; and those that would have accom- 
panied man w^ould be a different tribe of animals, more fitted to 
minister to his wants, so that with respect to these the diflftculty 
still remains — they could not have reached the country unless 
under the guidance of Providence, and the same power that 
accomplished their removal to that appointod for their resi- 
dence, prevented their leaving any of their race in the regions 
through which they passed. 

There is only one supposition that will enable us to account 
for the transport of these animals in a natural way, which is 
this, that immediately subsequent to the deluge, America and 
New Holland, and the various other islands that are inhabited 
by peculiar animals, w^ere once connected with Asia and Africa, 
by the intervention of lands that have since been submerged. 
Plato, in his Timseus, relates a tradition concerning an island 
called Atlantis, w^hicli he describes as bigger than Asia and 
Africa, situated before the pillars of Hercules, which after an 
earthquake was swallowed up by the sea. According to his 
statement, this account was given by the Egyptian priests at 
Sais, to Solon, the Athenian legislator. Catcott, in his history 
of the deluge, seems to give some credit to this tradition, and 
supposes that Phaleg took his name, not from the confusion of 
tongues at Babel, and the subsequent division of the earth 
amongst the families of the three sons of Noah, but from its di- 
vision occasioned by the subsidence of this great island, by 
which the occidental were separated from the oriental coun- 
tries of the globe. Philo Judaeus speaks of this catastrophe in 
terms that imply he gave credit to it, as does also Tertullian ; 
but it appears to me to rest on too uncertain a base, and to be 



28 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

too much mixed with evident faWt and allegory, to claim full 
credit as a real fact in the history of our globe. Still that 
many violent convulsions have taken place since the deluge 
is generally supposed. Our own island is thought once to 
have formed part of the continent, Sicily to have been united 
to Italy, with many other instances mentioned by Pliny. It 
is equally probable that the islands of the Indian Archipelago 
were at one time joined to that part of Asia. Whether such 
disruptions from the continents were simultaneous, or took 
place at different periods, is uncertain ; but if such an event as 
the submersion of the vast island of Plato did really happen, it 
surely would affect the whole terraqueous globe, produce con- 
vulsions far and wide, and cause various disruptions in its crust, 
and elevations in other parts from the bed of the ocean. It 
throws some weight into this scale, that thus a way would be 
open, though certainly a circuitous one, for the migration of 
those animals to America, that are found in no other part of 
the world, and, supposing Asia to have been disrupted from it 
at Behrings Straits, could scarcely have ascended to so high a 
latitude, in search of their destined home. 

Malte-Brun, in his geography, after proving that the animals 
in question could have passed neither from Africa nor Asia, ob- 
serves — "Nothing, therefore, remains, but the accommodating 
resource of a tremendous convulsion of nature, with a vast 
tract of country swallowed up by the waves, which formerly 
united America with the temperate regions of the old world. 
Such conjectures as these, however, being devoid of all histo- 
rical support, do not merit a moment's consideration; conse- 
quently we cannot refrain from admitting, that the animals of 
America originated on the very soil, which, to this present day, 
they still inhabit." 

That it might have been the will of the Creator (o people 
the country in question by the immediate production of a new 
race of animals, suited to its climate and circumstances, I will 
notdeny,butIwould onlyask,is itcoiisistentwith whatoccurred 
at the deluge] Surely the task of Noah would have been 
much less ditficultand laborious, had it been merely necessary for 
him to construct a vessel fitted for the reception of himself and 
family,and of food for their sustenance during (heir confinement ; 
and a new race of animals had been created, adapted to the then 
stale of the earth and mankind. Hut such was not the will of 
God, and, doubtless, for wise reasons. He would neither create 
a new race of men, nor a new race of animals, when the world 
might be rcjwopied by tliose ahojidy in being. This would not 
have harmonized with the ordinary proceedings of his pro vi- 



DISTRIBUTION OP ANIMALS. 29 

dence. Whoever examines the animals of North America, will 
find a vast number that correspond with European species, dis- 
tinguished only by characters that mark varieties. On the 
Rocky Mountains, and in the country westward of that range, 
Asiatic types are discoverable, both in the vegetable ahd ani- 
mal kingdoms.* Several animals, likewise, of the southern 
part of that Continent belong to old world genera, and also 
species. I have received from Valparaiso a beetle, common 
in Britain,^ and Molina mentions several other European ge- 
nera, as natives of ChiU ; so part of the animal population of 
the New World appears to have been derived from Europe and 
Asia ; and if so, there is a door open, through which Providence 
might also have conducted those North American animals that 
are found in no other country. 

But besides the probable, or possible, modes by which the 
transit of animals to their respective settlements might have 
been accomplished, Mr Lyell, in the second volume of his 
Principles of Geology, has suggested one which might, amongst 
others, have been employed for this purpose. 

" Captain W. H. Smyth informs me," says he, " that, when 
cruising in the Cornwallis, amidst the Philippine islands, he 
has more than once seen, after those dreadful hurricanes called 
typhoons, floating islands of (matted) wood, with trees growing 
upon them ; and that ships have sometimes been in imminent 
peril, in consequence of mistaking them for terra firma." Mr 
Lyell conjectures, not improbably, that by means of such an 
insular raft, or wandering Delos, — " if the surface of the deep 
be calm, and the rafts carried along by a current, or wafted 
by a slight breath of air fanning the foliage of the green trees, 
it may arrive, after a passage of several weeks, at the bay of 
an island, into which its plants and animals may be poured out 
as from an ark ; and thus a colony of several hundred new spe- 
cies may at once be naturalized." Thus he accounts for the 
peopling of the volcanic and coral islands in the Pacific. 

It must be borne in mind that nothing really happens by 
chance, or is the result of an accidental concourse of fortui- 
tous events : second causes are always under the direction of 
the first, who ordereth all things according to the good plea- 
sure of his will ; and therefore the elevation of a new island 
from the bosom of the deep, whether immediately produced by 
volcanic agency, or by an earthquake, or built by Zoophytes, 
still may be denominated his work ; so likewise the same Al- 
mighty Guardian of the universe, whose name is Jehovah of 

1 See Appendix, note 14. 2 Sphodrus Terricola. 



30 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

Hosts, directs all the actions and motions of the hosts that he 
hath created, to the full accomplishment of every purpose that, 
in his wisdom, he hath formed. When we are assured that 
the hairs of our head are all numbered, and that not a sparrow 
fallelh without our Heavenly Father, we are instructed to 
look beyond second causes for the direction and management 
of events that appear at first sight the most trivial, but which, 
in their immediate or remote consequences, may be productive 
of effects that are important to be attended to and provided for.* 

We know that when animals of any kind exceed certain 
limits, though beneficial in the ordinary exercise of their in- 
stincts, they become noxious. God alone knows when they 
approach these limits ; it is he, therefore, that employs man or 
other animals to destroy a certain number of them, that they 
may bear a due proportion to other beings on which they act ; 
or if he wills to punish mankind, he suffers their numbers to 
increase so as to answer this intention. But to all his hosts, 
he says, " Thus far shall thou go and no further^ Therefore, 
when the ocean, or fires below its bed, or other causes elevate 
islands above its surface, it is he that conducts to them the po- 
pulation he intends should occupy them. 

The islands of Bourbon and Mauritius both appear to be of 
volcanic origin : amongst their aboriginal animal inhabitants 
was a most extraordinary gallinaceous bird, called the Dodo ;* 
this bird, like the ostrich and cassowary, had only rudiments 
of wings, and of course was unable to fly ; being unfit for food, 
though of the gaUinaceous order, and a very ugly and disgust- 
ing object, it soon became extinct in those islands, and the 
only remains of it are a leg and foot at the British Museum, 
and a skeleton of the head in ihe Aslmiolean Museum at Ox- 
ford. It has been contended that this bird, having never been 
discovered elsewhere, was peculiar to these islands, but there 
are reasons for believing, that it was not the only species of its 
genus, for Latham has included in it two others,^ both stated 
to have been found in African islands. This affords a strong 
presumption that the head quarters of the geiuis are on the 
continent of Africa, and tliat these three species have been 
conveyed to tlie islands they are stated to have inhabited by 
some accidental cause. By the direction of Providence, a 
floating island, like tliat seen by Captain Smyth, might be 
the means of conveying this and their other inhabitants to 
them. 



I AppondiA, note ir>. 2 Didus inrptus. 

3 Didns soUtnriu.^ nnd vnznrrnv.t. 



DISTRIBUTION 6f ANIMALS. 3f 

I thyik, therefore, that there is no necessity to have recourse 
to a new and more recent creation, to account for the introduc- 
tion of its pecuhar animals into any given country. 

The fact itself, that ahnost every country has its pecuhar 
animals, affords a proof of design, and of the adaptation of 
means to an end, demonstrating the intervention and guidance of 
an invisible Being, of irresistible power, to whose will all things 
yield obedience, and whose wisdom and goodness are conspicu- 
ous in all the arrangements he has made. Wherever we see 
a peculiar class of animals we usually see peculiar circum- 
stances which require their presence. Thus the Elephant 
and Rhinoceros, the Lion and the Tiger, are fonnd only in 
warm climates, where a rapid vegetation, and infinite hosts of 
animals, seem to require the efforts of such gigantic and fero- 
cious devourers to keep them in check : but on this subject 1 
shall have occasion to enlarge hereafter. 

There is another point of view, illustrative of the Divine 
attributes in this partial location of various animals. If every 
region, or nation, contained within its limits the entire circle 
that constitutes the animal kingdom, and the remark may be 
extended to every natural object-, how weak and trifling would 
be the incitement for man to visit his fellov/-men. Were the 
productions of every country the same, there would be little or 
no temptation for commercial speculation, therefore the mer- 
chant would stay at home; the animal, and plants, and mine- 
rals would be the same, therefore the naturalist would stay at 
home ; the astronomer indeed, and geographer, and the student 
of his own species, might be tempted sometimes to roam, but 
the ocean would be truly dissociable, and those ties that now 
connect the different nations of the globe would, for the most 
part, be broken. They are now linked to each other, in a 
bond of amity, by the intercourse which their mutual wants 
produce, and the body geographical, if I may use such a met- 
aphor, as well as the body natural, is so tempered, and so 
furnished in every part, that constant supplies of things, neces- 
sary or desirable, are uninterruptedly circulating, by certain 
channels, through the whole system ; and thus keep up a kind 
of systole and diastole, which diffuses every where a healthy 
temperament, and is universally beneficial. It is, moreover, 
calcidated to generate those kindly feelings which ought to 
reciprocate between beings inhabiting the same globe, and 
sprung from the same original father. And the cultivation of 
these feelings of mutual good will was, no doubt, the principal 
object of the Deity in the distribution of various gifts to various 
countries, endowing some with one peculiar production and 



32 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

some with another : so that one might not say to anotljer, " / 
have no t^eed of you" 

Herein is the Divine wisdom and goodness most conspicuous. 
Had chance, or nature, as some love to speak, directed the 
distribution of animals, and they were abandoned to themselves 
and to the circumstances in which they found themselves in 
their original station, without any superintending power to 
guide them, they would not so invariably have fixed them- 
selves in the climates and regions for which they were evi- 
dently intended. Their migrations, under their own sole 
guidance, would have depended, for their direction, upon the 
season of the year, at which the desire seized them to change 
their quarters : in the height of summer, the tropical animals 
might have taken a direction further removed from the tropics; 
and, in winter, those of colder climates might have journeyed 
towards instead of from them. Besides, taking into considera- 
tion other motives, from casual circumstances, that might have 
induced different individuals belonging to the same climates to 
pursue different routes, they might be misled by cupidity, or 
dislike, or fear. On no other principle, can we explain the 
adaptation of their organization to the state and productions of 
the country in which we find them — I speak of local species 
— but that of a Supreme Power, who formed and furnished 
the country, organized them for it, and guided them into it. 

There is another question relating to local animals which 
here requires some notice. Are they really distinct species ? 
Have not the characters which separate them from their af- 
finities been produced, in the course of years, by peculiar cir- 
cumstances in which they are placed, such as climate, tempe- 
rature, nature of the country, food, and the like ] Every per- 
son who knows any thing of the history of animals must admit, 
that great changes do take place in them from the long action 
of these causes. For instance, some varieties of the common 
ox are polled, having only rudiments of horns; others have 
very short and others very long ones ; in some they are not 
fixed to the skull, but attached to the skin, and movable 
with it. The same thing, likewise, takes place with sheep; 
some have no horns, others have two, and one breed, the 
Icelandic, is distinguished by having four. How these varia- 
tions have been produced, and by what circumstances they 
are ruled, has not been ascertained, nor what differences, 
in other respects, obtain betAvecn the armed and unarmed 
varieties. Linne indeed observed, with respect to tlie polled 
sheep, which he denominates English sheep, — h\\{ wliether 
they are strictly entitled to that name is not clear, for in llic 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 33 

pillars of Trajan and Antoninus, though there are no polled 
oxen, there are polled sheep, — that their tails and scrotum reach 
to the knees ; but this does not appear a certain and invaria- 
ble fact. A young zoologist, when his attention is first arrest- 
ed by these facts, will probably be inclined to think that ani- 
mals, exhibiting such striking differences, cannot belong to the 
same species ; but in the progress of liis experience, especially 
in what takes place in almost all animals that man has taken 
into alliance with him, he will see reason to change his senti- 
ments. 

Again, the ears of some animals also exhibit differences that 
might seem to indicate specific distinction. We see this both 
in the horse and the swine. In the' wild horse the ears lie 
back, in the domesticated or cultivated one they are erect. 
The horse was not originally a native of America ; but when 
the Spaniards and other nations obtained a footing in that 
country, they carried this animal with them, which is now be- 
come wild, and numerous herds of them are found in the 
Llanos, these generally, we are told, are of a chestnut bay, and 
have recumbent ears. Those that are found wild in the 
Steppes of Tartary, have the hair of the mane and tail very 
long and thick, and their ears also are recumbent. A writer, 
quoted below, has concluded from some observations of Xeno- 
phon and Varro, that the military horses of the Greek and Ro- 
man republics w^ere much nearer those in the wild state, as 
just described, than in a subsequent period.^ In all the war 
horses, however, sculptured in Trajan's and Antoninus's pillars, 
the ears are erect, as I think also are those of the Elgin mar- 
bles in the British Museum — at least, none of them appear to 
be recumbent; and in some figured in Hamilton's JEgyptiaca,^ 
from sculptures at Medinet Abou, in Egypt, which are still 
more ancient, the ears of all are erect. 

In England we have two breeds of swine, one with large 
flapping or pendent ears ; of this description are those fattened 
in the distilleries in and near London; the other with small, 
erect, acute ears, common in the county of Suffolk. 

When it is considered, that the varities of the above animals 
with erect ears appear to exhibit altogether a better character, 
if I may so speak, than their less spirited brethren, whose ears 
are pendent or laid back, and that this circumstance seems to 
indicate some approach to civilization in them ; it may, pro- 
bably, be deemed to result from some developement of the brain 

1 Roulin. Anim. Domest. Jnn. Dcs. Sc. Nat. xvi. 26. 

2 PI. viii. ix. 

E 



34 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

produced by education, and present some analogy to tlie effects 
of the latter in the human species. 

There is a certain protuberance growing on the back, be- 
tween the shoulders, and consisting chiefly of fat, which dis- 
tinguishes the Indian oxen, both the larger and smaller varie- 
ties, from our own, which is known sometimes to attain to the 
enormous weight of fifty pounds ; the ox of Surat is stated to 
have two of these bosses, or humps. Now, Burckhardt has 
observed, with respect to the camel, that — "While the hump 
continues full, the animal will endure considerable fatigue on 
a very short allowance, feeding, as the Arabs say, on the fat 
of its own hump. After a long journey the hump almost en- 
tirely subsides, and it is not till after three or four month's re- 
pose, and a considerable time after the rest of the carcass has 
acquired flesh, that it resumes its natural size of one fourth of 
the whole body." This conjecture of the Arabs may, very 
probably, be well founded, for it is known that animals which 
become torpid in the winter, are very fat and have several 
cauls abounding in that substance ; but when they awake 
from their long repose in the spring, they have absorbed a large 
proportion of it, and are comparatively lean, and more fit for 
action. During their torpidity the fat is absorbed into the 
system by means of the lymphatic vessels and the ramifications 
of the veins. It is stated, however, that the Bear comes out 
of its winter-quarters as fat as it went into them, but that in a 
few days, it becomes very lean.^ In this case it would seem 
as if there was little or no absorption during hybernation, and 
that it becomes very rapid upon the animal's emersion from its 
hiding place. 

Reasoning from analogy, the hump on the Zebu may have 
some such use, and during the dry season, when the food is 
scorched up, may minister to the nutriment of the animal. If 
this be the case, this variation from the common type is evi- 
dently designed, and furnishes a proof of the care of the Crea- 
tor for all his creatures, and likewise of such an adaptation of 
rlfieans to an end, as evince both the wisdom, power, and pre- 
science of Him who has so arranged circumstances and agents 
in every climate as to fulfil his benevolent purposes. 

The allwise Governor of the universe, when he gave to the 
sheep its covering, appears to have had in view not solely the 
protection of the animal from the eflbcts of cold, but more par- 
ticularly the benefit of him whom he had enthroned at the 
head of his creation, by thus placing at his disposal a material 

1 Dr. Richardson, Faun. BorcaU-Anicric. i. l(», 2(1. 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 35 

SO inestimable, for hisf use and comfort, as wool. It has been 
observed that all the wild sheep are clothed with long hair; 
but the Guinea sheep,^ which is found in the tropical countries, 
both of Africa and India, is the most truly hairy of any, evi- 
dently a provision of the Author of nature, suited to the cli- 
mate in which they are found. The fine fleeces of the culti- 
vated breeds appear to have been engrafted, as it were, on the 
long hair of the wild ones, which, doubtless, have been very 
much improved by the attention paid by man to his flocks. 
The influence of climate, the quality of pasturage, a due sup- 
ply of wholesome food in winter; and washing and shearing 
when summer approaches, have all, certainly, contributed to 
the improvement of this staple of our commerce. But it was 
God who endowed these animals with those facilities, if I may 
so speak, of which man availing himself, might produce by 
culture the valuable article, in its highest perfection, of which 
I am here speaking. What a difference between the hair of 
the Guinea sheep, and the beautiful fleece of the Merino, which 
even seems to be exceeded, in fineness and softness, by the 
straight wool of the Parnassian breed. 

No animal, if indeed all belong to one original species, varies 
morethan one that is most domesticated of any, the dog: some, as 
the water-dog,^ being covered with curled hair almost as thick 
as the fleece of a sheep, while others, the Turkish-dog,^ are 
absolutely naked ; others again, the grey-hound,* being very 
slender, with long slender muzzle and legs, remarkable for 
their velocity and the quickness of their sight; others lastly, 
the hound,^ more robust in form, less swift in motion, with a 
short obtuse muzzle, depending chiefly upon their scent in 
pursuit of their prey. Whoever studies all these supposed va- 
rieties, and the diversified functions which they exercise in our 
service, as our faithful and attached companions, the watchful 
guardians and defenders of our property, the purveyors of our 
table, and the ministers of our pleasures, must acknowledge the 
wisdom, goodness, and power of the Creator in the production 
of so versatile a race, applicable, in so many ways, to such a 
variety of purposes, many of them of the first importance. 
Without them some nations would have no means of convey- 
ance from place to place ;^ and others would scarcely be able to 
supply themselves with a sufficiency of food.'' 

1 Ovis aries africana. — L. 2 Cards familiaris aquaticus. 

3 Canis familiaris cBgijptius. 4 Canis familiaris grains. 

5 Canis familiaris molossus. 6 The Kamtchadales. 

7 Many of the North American Indians, Esquimaux, &c. 



36 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

Amongst the birds there is one tribe pecuharly domesticaleil, 
which hkewise is subject to numerous variations (it will be 
readily seen that I allude to our common poultry), but the 
differences that obtain in them are chiefly confined to their 
plumage ; some are crowned with a tuft of feathers ; others, as 
the Friesland-hen, have the feathers on their body recurved ; 
another breed, as the rumplets, have no tail; the generality 
have their legs naked, but the bantams have them covered with 
feathers; and, to name no more, the silk-hens, instead of feath- 
ers, are clothed with a kind of silken hair. 

We cannot state the object of all these differences, but 
probably it is connected with the climate and other circum- 
stances of the country in which they were produced. India 
and its islands appears to be the metropolis of this valuable 
species of fowl, and the jungle fowl is supposed to be the 
original breed ; but this is one of those animals which will live 
and thrive in every climate except the Polar; and when we 
consider the benefits we derive from them, we shall be disposed 
with grateful hearts to adore and glorify our Almighty bene- 
factor, who fitted them, as well as so many other useful 
animals, to become, like ourelves, denizens of the whole earth. 
It is a remarkable circumstance, and worthy of particular 
attention, that the animals most subject to variation, are chiefly 
those w^hich man has taken into alliance with him from their 
adaptation to his purposes. Now this tendency to vary mul- 
tiplies their uses, or, at least, contributes to fit them for fol- 
lowing him into different cHmates, enabling them to accommo- 
date themselves gradually to any change of circumstances to 
which they may therein be exposed, without diminishing their 
utility. 

Amongst the other races, especially the feline, this appears 
not to take place, at least only with respect to colour. The 
cat, though every wliere domesticated, exhibits no otiier differ- 
ences than what obtain in the colour of her fur. If we recol- 
lect that this favourite quadruped is principally employed to 
destroy those minor animals that are noxious in and about our 
houses, to which indeed her instinct impels her, and that she 
is solely led by that instinct, and adds nothing to it from in- 
struction, lier sole savage object being, like that of her con- 
geners, to seize and devour her prey; that she never assists 
man, like the dog, as the companion of liis sports in various 
ways, but exercises her single function always in the same 
way, and under the same influence: if we further recollect that 
these are the geneial habits of the geiuis to which she belongs, 
which appear subject to very t rival njodilicatious from altered 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 37 

circumstances, and tliat almost all animals that do not follow 
in the train of man are equally constant, we may hence infer 
that the Creator has not gifted them with the capability of 
improvement, and the developement of latent qualities not ap- 
parent in their wild state. 

There is one circumstance, however, in which predaceous or 
carnivorous animals, when domesticated, show some aberraiion 
from their instinct, they do not refuse farinaceous food. The 
cat and the dog will both eat bread with great eagerness and 
thrive upon it. 

It has been questioned by some whether the present races 
of animals have not all, in the lapse of ages, undergone some 
alterations from the primitive types. The only way by which 
ihis can be at all ascertained is by consulting the oldest de- 
scriptions of them, and the oldest sculptures ; and these, I think, 
will prove that no such alteration has taken place. 

In considering the general distribution of animals we may 
further remark that some are stationary, while others, at cer- 
tain periods, migrate or shift their quarters from one climate or 
region to another. 

In considering the former, I shall not here enlarge on the 
stations of the different tribes further than as they are connected 
with the great object, which it is my duty to illustrate. With 
respect to many it may be observed, that though perhaps widely 
dispersed, yet they have their metropolis.^ Thus the gigantic 
whales, though they are sometimes found in low latitudes, not, 
however, within the tropics, yet their grand rendezvous is in the 
arctic and antarctic seas; furnishing a strong proof that in these 
they find the greatest supply of their appropriate food. The 
giant terrestrial Mammalia, on the contrary, confine them- 
selves to intratropical regions, where the luxuriance of vegeta- 
tion best corresponds with their enormous consumption of food. 
Amongst the birds the Vulture, though one species, the Lam- 
mer-Geyer,2 comes as far north as the Swiss Alps, generally 
most abounds in hot climates, and is often of essential service 
in preventing the infection, likely to be produced by putrid 
animals; to these birds, our Saviour's words, doubtless, al- 
lude, " Wheresoever the carcass is, there will the eagles be gathered 
together f"^ the species he had in his eye, was probably the 
Egyptian Vulture,^ the services of which in Egypt are strik- 
ingly described by Hasselquist. After noticing its disgusting 
appearance, he says: "Notwithstanding this, the inhabitants 

1 See Introd. to Ent. iv. Lett. xlix. 2 Vultur Barbatas 

3 Vtdtur percnopteruSfh. 



38 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

of Egypt cannot be enough thankful to Providence for this 
bird. All the places round Cairo are filled with the dead 
bodies of asses and camels; and tliousands of these birds fly 
about and devour the carcasses, before they putrify, and fill the 
air with noxious exhalations." Belon observes, which proves 
their prevalence there, that in Palestine they devour an infinite 
number of mice, which would otherwise be a great pest. The 
cognate tribe, the eagles, though they are widely dispersed, have 
their metropolis in more northern climates, and are distinguished 
also from the vultures, by making living animals chiefly their 
prey: for this they are gifted with a wonderful aculeness of 
sight, and indomitable strength of wing, and of legs and talons, 
fitting them for astonishing velocity of flight, and for resistless 
force, when they attack and bear off their prey. As they have 
no scent, their eyes are of infinite use, and enable them to dis- 
cern a small bird at an almost incredible distance: and often 
to get a clearer view and more extensive horizon, when they 
leave their mountain aeries, they ascend to a great height. 
M. Ramond, when he had ascended the highest peak of the 
Pyrenees, saw an eagle soaring above him, flying directly in 
the teeth of a violent south-wester, with inconceivable velocity. 

Another genus of a tropical type, but not confined to the 
tropics, forming a striking contrast with the gigantic forms last 
adverted to, consists of the numerous species of the brilliant 
and diminutive Humming birds, which like the butterflies, 
whose analogues they are, suck the nectar of the flowers. 
This, strictly, American genus is in great force, also without 
the tropics, for they abound in Mexico, and go northward as 
far as Canada, and southward as far as Patagonia. There is 
no northern metropolis for any analogous form, to these living 
gems, which constitute the ornament and life of the new 
world. But the old shares with the new, in another beautiful 
type in the winged creation, I mean the Psittaceous or Parrot 
tribes, which chiefly support themselves upon fruits, and abound 
in all tropical countries, these the Creator has not only invested 
with the gayest colours and plumage, but gifted also with the 
power of speech, at least of imitating the speech of man, when 
brought into contact with him. Their principal residence is 
within the tropics, but not confined to them, as many are found 
in New Holland. The Aras* are confined to the new world, 
and one of its greatest ornaments; their plumage being the 
most brilliant of any of the Psittaceans. 

An analogous tribe of mammiferous animals inhabits the 

I Mncrocemin. ^ 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 39 

same station, and feeds on the same food with the parrots, 
these are what Zoologists call the Quadrumanes, or Four- 
handed beasts, from their often using their hind as well as their 
fore feet as hands, and many of them even their tail. This 
tribe includes the Monkeys, Apes, and Baboons, and though 
these do not imitate man, by catching his phrases, like the 
birds last named, yet they mimic all his actions. I have often 
thought, when I have examined figures of this tribe, that their 
features are typical of the different kinds of face observable in 
the human species : as far as relates to body they approach us, 
but in the spiritual part of our nature, elevated by high expec- 
tations, and by knowledge not confined to this globe on which 
we tread, but traversing the heavens, and penetrating in 
thought to the throne of Him who sitteth upon them, we in- 
finitely exceed them. 

Those animals that are of a predaceous or carnivorous char- 
acter, are more widely dispersed, than many of the herbivorous 
ones, in fact they are co-extensive with their food, I do not 
mean specifically, but generically. Though the Lion and the 
Tiger, and the larger fehne animals are generally tropical, yet 
the Cat is naturalized every where. Though the Hyaena and 
the Jackal shrink from the temperature of the greater part of 
Kurope, yet Wolves and Foxes, as well as the great majority 
of the canine race, are found indigenous, or have been formerly 
indigenous, in almost every part of it. 

Many more instances might be adduced proving that ani- 
mals have been placed originally in certain stations, adapted 
to the habits resulting from their organization and general 
structure, from which some of them have sent forth their colo- 
nies far and wide, while others, owing to peculiarities in these 
respects, requiring a given temperature and kind of food, or to 
local obstacles stopping their further progress, have not wan- 
dered beyond certain hmits. 

Having, in the preceding pages, endeavoured to account for 
the dispersion and present stations of the various members of 
the animal kingdom at large, not to leave the subject incom- 
plete, I must next make a few observations relative to that of 
the human race. 

It has been a favourite theory of some modern physiologists 
that God *^ hath not made of one blood all nations of men for to 
dwell on all the face of the earth,''^ but that there are different 
species of men as well as of animals : others, who do not go 
quite so far, suspect — that at the last great deluge, besides 
Noah and his family who were saved in the ark, some others 



40 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

escaped from that sad catastrophe by taking refuge on some of 
tlie highest mountain ridges of Asia and Africa, and seem to 
insinuate that from these arose the three principal races, the 
Caucasian, the Mongol, and the Negro, that now hold posses- 
sion of our globe/ I shall say something in controversion of 
each of these theories, beginning with the last. 

This indeed furnishes a clue for its own refutation, since it 
admits three principal stems, which is in accordance with the 
Mosaic account, that from the families of the three sons of Noah, 
the nations were divided in the earth after the flood. The 
author of the above theory seems disposed to admit the truth 
of the Mosaic account, but insinuates that it may have been 
only intended to instruct the Israelites in the history of the race 
to which they belonged, while that of other races may have 
been passed over in silence. It is too much the fashion, in this 
sceptical age, to evade the facts that are most clearly revealed 
in Scripture, by saying the language mustnot be taken strictly 
nor interpreted literall}^, even when it is concerning events in 
which there is no room for metaphor. One would think that 
the terms in which God foretold the deluge were of this de- 
scription. ^'And behold /, even /, do bring a flood of waters upon 
the earth, to destroy all flesh wherein is the breath of life from 
under heaven ; and everything that is in the earth s/iaZZ die." 
And again — " Arf the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth, 
and all the high hills that were under the whole heaven were 
covered : fifteen cubits upwards did the waters prevail, and the 
mountains loere covered." It is also stated that every living sub- 
stance, both man and cattle, &c., was destroyed from the earth, and 
that JVoa/i only remained alive, and they that were with him in the 
ark. Can language be more definite and express 1 

What can be more absurd than that an ark should be neces- 
sary for the saving of Noah and his family, and a world of 
animals, to be stored with a vast supply of provisions, when 
they might have escaped according to this hypothesis by tak- 
ing refuge on the summit of some lofty mountain to which 
Divine Wisdom might have directed them ? 

There is no occasion whatever for such a hypothesis to ac- 
count for the dispersion of mankind and their breaking into 
nations. Two chapters in the book of Genesis" set the whole 
matter in a clear light, both as to the first cause of their separa- 
tion, and the various tribes into which they separated, in which 
we can trace the names of many nations still in existence. 
From Babel each in due time took the course, in that direc- 

1 Outlines of Hist. Cnh. Cycl. ix. 1 2 ' Cliap. x xi 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 41 

tion, however led by circumstances, that Providence had de- 
creed. Europe became at last the head quarters of the de- 
scendants of Japhet, Asia of those of Shem, and Africa of those 
of Ham ; the Shemites in the lapse of ages, passing over to 
America, were the progenitors of the red or copper race of that 
continent. Nor were there any insurmountable obstacles in 
the way to prevent the peopling of the globe from one com- 
mon stock. Supposing Babel or Babylon to have been, so 
to speak, the centre of irradiation — how easy was the transit 
for Ham's descendants into Africa by the Isthmus of Suez ; 
into Europe, the path was still more open for those of Japhet; 
and as the stream of population spread to the East, the pass- 
age to America was not difficult to those who had arrived at 
Behrings Straits. But in all these countries mixtures with 
the aborigines have probably taken place, either from the ir- 
ruption and colonizations of great conquerors, the spread of 
commerce and similar causes, which naturally tend to produce 
variations in racesfrom the primitive type. Hence writers on 
this subject now reckon six races distinguished by their colour, 
viz. a white race ; a tawny race ; a red race ; a deep browr> 
race ; a brown-black race ; and a black race. 

This leads me to the other theory alluded to above, that 
there are different species of men as well as of other animals. 
The principal foundation upon which those naturalists have 
built their theory, that have adopted the opinion, that there 
are several distinct species of men originally created, is not 
only their colour, but likewise certain parts of their structure, 
which are found to vary in different races, such as the shape of 
the head ; the prominence, more or less, of the jaws, producing 
different facial angles ; the comparative length of some of the 
bones, and shape of the feet ; the degradation of intellect ; the 
peculiar acuteness of the senses ; the tenacity of the memory ; 
and, to name no more, the appropriation of a peculiar species 
of parasitic animal to a pecuUar race.* 

Various are the circumstances, w^hich, in the progress of 
generations, tend to produce differences between the different 
races which are now found inhabiting our globe, without hav- 
ing recourse to a theory that boldly contradicts or nullifies the 
word of God ; since the Scripture expressly declares, that God 
^^hath made of one blood all nations ofmen/for to dwell on all the 
face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, 

1 See N. Diet. D'Hist. Nat. xv. 150, Article Homme. White'* Regular 
Gradation in Man, &.c. S. 2. 
F 



42 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

and the bounds of their habitation.^^ Climate, the elevation of 
country, its soil, waters, woods, and other peculiarities ; the 
food, clothing, customs, habits, way of hfe, and state of civili- 
zation, often, of its inhabitants, produce effects upon the latter 
that are important and durable, and contribute to impress a 
peculiar character upon the different races of men as well as 
animals, that inhabit our globe, and will account for many dis- 
tinctions, which indicate that such an individual belongs to 
such a people. But these circumstances will not explain and 
satisfactorily account for ali the peculiar characters that distin- 
guish nations from each other, without having recourse to the 
will of a governing and all-directing Power, influencing cir- 
cumstances that happen in the common course, and, according 
to the established laws of nature, to answer the purposes of 
his Providence. When he confounded the speech and lan- 
guage of the descendants of Noah, congregated at Babel, he 
first made a division of mankind into nations; " And from thence 
did Jehovah scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.^^ 
The same Divine Power that effected this distinction, which 
may be called the origin of nationality, also decreed that na- 
tions should be further separated by differences of form and 
colour, as well as speech, which differences originated not in 
any change operated miracvilously, but produced by second 
causes, under the direction of the First. When we are told 
expressly that " The hairs of our head are all numbered,''^ and 
that in God's " Book all our members are wntten,^^ we learn, 
what in common parlance we acknowledge, that it is accord- 
ing to God's will that we are made so and so. That persons, 
who, in some one or other of their parts and organs, exhibit an 
approximation to races different from that to which they be- 
long, as thick hps, a prominent facial angle, a difference in the 
relative proportion of certain bones to each other, the curling 
of the hair, and the like, occur in all places, must be obvious 
to every one who uses his eyes and intellect. It is evident 
that all these variations are produced by circumstances that we 
cannot fully appreciate. Even in animals, there is as much 
difference in general characters between the Arabian steed of 
high blood,[fine form, indomitable spirit, and winged speed, and 
the brewer's dray-horse, of a strikingly opposite character, as 
there is between the European high-bred gentleman and the 
African negro. The long-legged swine of France, though 
exhibiting such a marked difference in the relative length of 
some of their bones, are still the same species with the short- 
legged swine of England. The same argument is strength- 
ened by the infinite varieties of the dog, the ertfct ears of the 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 43 

tame, and recumbent ones of the wild horse.* It is evident, 
therefore, from fact and from what ordinarily happens, that 
there are powers at work at and after conception, and while the 
foetus is in the womb, that can produce variations in the same 
people, approaching lo those that distinguish the Negro, the 
red man, or the brown man ; which, indeed, can produce forms 
much more singular and extraordinary ; for instance, the mon- 
sters that sometimes make their appearance in the world, as the 
Siamese youths, children with two heads, &c. The mysteri- 
ous influence that the excited imagination, or passions, or ap- 
pet ites of the mother, have over the foetus in her womb, is well 
known, and produces very extraordinary consequences, and 
malformations, and monstrosities. When we consider that all 
these facilities, if I may so speak — these tendencies to produce 
variations in the foetus, are at the disposal of Him, who up- 
holds all things by the word of his power, and turns them to 
the fulfilment of his own purposes, — we may imagine that thus 
new types may be produced, which may be continued in the 
ordinary way of generation ; according to that observation of 
Humboldt, that " The exclusion of all foreign mixtures con- 
tributes to perpetuate varieties, or aberrations from the com- 
mon standard."^ That what at first were family characters, 
accompany the race when grown into a nation, is evident from 
the case of the Jews, who, wherever dispersed, exhibit certain 
common characters by which they are every where known ; 
and, with respect to complexion, they are said to vary accord- 
ing to the climates in which they reside. A singular excep- 
tion to this is furnished by the black Jews of Malabar, men- 
tioned by Dr Buchanan. At Cochin, he says, there are two 
classes of Jews, the white and the black Jews. The latter 
are supposed to have arrived in India soon after the Babylonian 
captivity ; at least, they have that tradition amongst them, 
which seems confirmed by the fact that they have copies only 
of those books of the Old Testament which were written pre- 
viously to the captivity. The white Jews emigrated from 
Europe to India in later ages. Now here is a singular fact, 
that in the lapse of so many ages a white or tawny race has 
become black. Mr White endeavours to account for such an 
aberration from his principle, that colour does not result from 
climate, by an observation not altogether founded in fact — 
namely, that the Jews have gained proselytes in every country 
in which they have resided, and, being at liberty to marry 
those proselytes, this would produce mixed breeds. But though 

1 See above, p. 33. 2 Personal Travels, v. ii. 565. 



44 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

the Jews, in our Saviour's time, would compass sea and land 
to gain one proselyte, this has not been their character since 
the destruction of Jerusalem, and we never hear now of their 
making proselyies. Indeed, these black Jews of Cochin seem 
to have been settled there long before any white ones came to 
that place. 

With regard to the degradation of the intellect, and the 
peculiar acuteness of the senses or memory of certain races; 
these furnish no proof whatever of specific distinctions, or that 
they could not be descended from the common ancestor of our 
species. 

Humboldt has an important observation which will explain 
how this might happen without having recourse to such a sup- 
position. Speaking of the barbarism of certain tribes of Ameri- 
cans and Asiatics, he observes : — " The barbarism that prevails 
throughout these different regions is, perhaps, less owing to a 
primitive absence of all kind of civilization, than to the effects 
of a long degradation. The greater part of the hordes, which 
we designate under the name of savages, descend, probably, 
from nations more advanced in cultivation."* And in another 
place : — " If it be true that savages are for the most part de- 
graded races, remnants escaped from a common shipwreck, as 
their languages, their cosmogonic fables, a crowd of other indi- 
cations seem to prove." 

Now, what is it that degrades man, and causes him to 
make an approach towards the brute 1 Setting up sense above 
reason and intellect ; sight above faith ; this world above the 
next. Experience teaches us, that those faculties of our 
nature that are most cultivated, become most acute: if intel- 
lectual pursuits are neglected, the intellect itself becomes 
weakened; in proportion as the senses are exercised, they are 
strengthened ; in proportion as the pleasures they afford us stand 
high or low in our estimation, we graduate towards the brute, 
which knows no pleasures but those of sense, or towards the 
angel who knows no pleasures but what are spiritual. There 
is a governing principle in man,'^ originally enthroned in him by 
his Creator, and to whose sway the senses were originally in 
complete subjection. But when man fell, a struggle was 
generated, the lower or sensual part of his nature striving to 
gain the rule over him, and to dethrone the higher or intellec- 
tual. This is the " law in our members loarrins' as;ainst the law 
of our own mind^"* mentioned by the Apostle. Now, we know 
that the same individual, at dillerent periods of life, may be 

1 Personal Travels. E. T. iii. 208. 2 To »l>»/uow»ior. 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 45 

directed in his actions first by one and then by the other of 
these laws; he may begin in sense, and end in spirit, or vice 
versa. If the former takes place in him, his nature and char- 
acter are elevated, and he is become more intellectual; if the 
latter, they are degraded, and he is become more sensual and 
nearer to a brute, and yet in both cases he remains the same 
man as before; his species is not altered. Apply this to 
nations, will it follow, because one is now generally gifted with 
a greater degree of intellect, and another remarkable for more 
acute sensation, that, therefore, they cannot be derived from a 
common origin? Nations are often led by custom as well as 
individuals; they, therefore, usually walk in the path that their 
ancestors have trod before them, and, from circumstances con- 
nected with this, it happens that some apply their faculties to 
higher pursuits than others. Those that chiefly cultivate the 
intellect improve it by that very act; while those who are 
principally engaged in pursuits that require the constant and 
skilful use of the organs of sensation acquire a degree of expert- 
ness in that use not to be met with in the others; but the 
intellect being employed only upon low objects, becomes 
habitually degraded, and loses all taste for things that are not 
visible and tangible. Though in an individual, or in a long 
succession of individuals, this might not produce a perceptible 
contraction and non-developement of the organ of the intellect, 
or in the chamber that contains it; yet, in the lapse of ages and 
generations, this effect would gradually be produced, for if an 
organ is not used for a long course of years, it becomes con- 
tracted, and from long habit unapt to perform its natural 
functions. Some American nations, by the application of 
boards properly shaped, depress the skull-bone of their infants, 
thinking a flat head a great beauty, whence the tribe is distin- 
guished by the name of Pallotepallors, or Flat-.heads. Others, 
by the same means, give them a conical form; there is no 
diflSculty, therefore, in conceiving that with a gradual con- 
traction of the brain, that of the skull might take place in the 
foetus, which would accommodate one to the other. With 
regard to the memory, it is not wonderful that a being who 
occupies his time and intellect with few objects, should have a 
more distinct recollection of certain events, than one whose 
attention is more divided. It may be observed, of the lower 
orders in general, that their memory, for the same reason, of 
matters within their own sphere of comprehension, is often 
more clear than that of persons better educated and informed. 
I remember the case of a negro who resided near Bury St 
Edmunds, who was an educated man, and published a volume 



46 GEOGRAPHICAL AND LOCAL 

of poems by subscription, which did him no discredit.* Hence, 
it is evident that there is a difference of capacity in negroes as 
well as whites, which admits of improvement from instruction 
and study, when they come among civihzed people. Little 
stress will be laid on the parasite of the negroes,^ being speci- 
fically distinct from that which infests the whites, when we 
reflect that the horse and the ox have different insect parasites 
and assailants in different climates. There is a time fixed upon 
in the divine counsels when the curse shall cease ; and it will 
then be found that by reversing the course that has degraded 
so many nations, the apostacy, namely, from God to idolatries 
of the most debasing kind — which has yielded them up a prey 
to sensuality, clouded their understandings, and, instead of 
universal good-will,, has taught them to regard those that are 
not of their own tribe or caste as objects of just hatred and in- 
jury — when this course has been reversed and the}?- are brought 
back to God, which will take place in his time and at his 
word ; and by the means and instruments that he empowers 
and commissions,^ they will become more elevated in their 
character, and assume a higher rank among the nations: and 
they will make good their claim to the same inheritance with 
the other members of the Christian family. He who decreed 
the end, decrees also the means. When the Lord gave the word, 
great was the company of those that published it. This was the 
case at the first preaching of the Gospel, when the gross dark- 
ness of heathen idolatry covered the earth ; this also was the 
case at what may be called its republication at the time of the 
Reformation, when the gross darkness of papal idolatry had 
almost put out the hght of truth in the church ; and so shall 
it be again, should another and perhaps last cloud of error en- 
velope the world with darkness,* which seems even now begin- 
ning to gather, and may we not hope that it will be followed 
by that happy time, foretold by the prophet, when — the know- 
ledge of the Lord shall cover the earth as the waters cover tJie sea ? 
The old curse on Ham's offspring shall then cease, he shall no 
longer be a servant of servants to his brethren; then shall the 
curse also that has driven the children of Abraham after the 
flesh into every region of the globe, cease, and they shall look 
on him whom they pierced, and be restored to the favour of 
their God, and to their own land f and next, in its own day, 

1 He was called Ignatius Sancho. 2 Prtlinila." Aigritnrum. 

3 See Appendix, note 16. 4 See Appendix, note 17. 

5 See Appendix, note 18. 



DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 47 

the original curse, also pronounced upon Adam and his poste- 
rity shall be obliterated and done away for ever. 

Taking all the circumstances I have noticed into considera- 
tion, I trust I have made it clear, that the variations observable 
in the different races of men are not of such a nature as to 
render it impossible, or improbable, that they should all have 
been derived from a common stock; and that the degradations 
observable in some of them, and approximation to the highest 
of the brutes, was caused not by the will and fiat of the Crea- 
tor, but by their own wilful departure from him, and voluntary 
self-debasement. Because they did not like to retain God in 
their knowledge, he gave them over to a reprobate mind to do those 
things that are not convenient: further, that with respect to those 
characters, which distinguish one nation from another, they 
may be attributed to the action of physical causes directed by 
the Deity : who, to use the language of a pious and excellent 
poet, 

Lives through all life, extends through all extent. 
Spreads undivided, operates unspent. 



There is another interesting subject connected with the geo- 
graphy of animals, which may find its place here ; a subject 
than which none shows more evidently or strikingly the hand 
of a beneficent and ever watchful Providence, holding the 
reins ; and upon certain occasions and at certain seasons, di- 
recting various animals to change their quarters, and seek often 
in distant countries a more genial chmate, in which they may 
give birth to their young, or find a better supply of food for 
their own support. I shall, therefore, now devote a few pages 
to the migrations of animals. 

The most general principle that causes emigration is com- 
mon to man and animals. When a country is over-peopled, 
and can no longer maintain its inhabitants, unless some means 
can be devised at home, by which the pressure may be light- 
ened, and the suffering classes enabled to procure the neces- 
saries of life, there must inevitably be some outbreak; when 
the rivers can no longer be contained within their natural chan- 
nel they will overflow, and spread desolation around, till they 
have passed away and found a place in the great receptacle of 
waters. Thus, in ancient times, the great northern hive sent 
forth its numberless swarms, and overturned and divided 
amongst them a considerable portion of that mighty empire 



48 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

which extended its iron sway over the fairest portion of the 
globe. ^ - 

With regard to their migrations, animals may be divided 
into two classes. The first will consist of those that migrate 
casually, under a certain pressure ; and the second of those 
that migrate periodically, or at certain seasons. 

1 . Of the first description, are those infinite armies of Locusts, 
which, when they have laid bare one country, as an oversha- 
dowing and dark cloud pregnant with the wrath of heaven, 
pass on to another; mighty conquerors of old, of whom they 
were the symbols, from Sesostris to Sennacherib and Nebuchad- 
nezzar, also mark their progress by devastation and ruin ; to 
use the graphic language of the prophet — " The land is as the 
garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilder- 
ness.''^ 

This plague has generally been considered as belonging to 
the old world, in which they seldom exceed latitude 42°, but in 
North America, there is a species of Locust or Grass-hopper, as 
Dr Richardson informs me, according to the report of the In- 
dians, becoming prevalent about once in twenty years, which 
committed great devastations at lord Selkirk's colony of Red 
river, as high as latitude 52°. They made their first appear- 
ance in vast flights coming from the plains to the westward, 
and soon destroyed the crops of grain, and every thing green. 
They re-appeared for three or four successive summers, each 
year in smaller numbers, and now for several years they have 
not been seen. 

These were evidently insects of the same order and tribe 
with the locust, though perhaps of a different genus ; but, pro- 
bably the tradition of the Indians might relate to another North 
American devastator, which is also called there the Locust, but 
belongs to a genus beloved by the Greeks for its song, and hated 
by the less imaginative Romans for its stunning noise, wliich 
may be called the Tree Locust ; a species of which is said to 
appear, about once in every seventeen years,' in such prodigious 
numbers as to do incalculable damage to the fruit and forest 
trees, in which it deposits its eggs, and upon which it feeds in- 
ternally in the grub state, but the oral organs of the perfect in- 
sect are only calculated for suction. 

Amongst quadrupeds, the analogues, in some respects, of the 
locusts, are the Lemmings, a kind of mouse or rat. These little 

1 See Appendix, note 19. 

2 See on the Locusts Introd. to Knf. I liOtt. vh 

3 Cicada sepLcndrrim. — L. 



MIGRATIONS- 49 

animals, which usually inhabit the mountains of Norway and 
Lapland, in certain seasons, emigrate in prodigious numbers to 
the south ; the most common species^ is said not to lay up any 
winter store, but to form burrows under ground in summer, and 
under the snow in winter in search of food ; but that found in 
Kamtschatka,^ which is larger than a rat, is stated to be occu- 
pied during the summer in laying up provisions for the winter 
in holes under the turf divided into compartments, they consist 
of various kinds of roots, some even poisonous, but which agree 
with this animal, and of which it collects from twenty to thirty 
pounds. It is called in Kamtschatka Tegulchitch. In fine 
weather its instinct teaches it to spread its harvest of roots in 
the sun to dry and fit them for keeping. When these different 
species of Lemmings make their excursions, which take place 
only in certain years and seasons, and in different directions, 
the species last mentioned going towards the west, the others 
towards the south, like certain ants, they always march straight 
forward, neither turning to the right hand nor to the left, and 
if their course is interrupted by a river, they cross it by swim- 
ming. The common Lemmings, when they migrate, are re- 
garded as a terrible scourge ; they devastate the fields and gar- 
dens, ruin the harvest, and only what is kept in the houses 
escapes them, into these happily they never enter. Their num- 
ber is so prodigious, that, when they die, the air is infected, and 
much sickness is the consequence. All this tribe of mice ap- 
pear to live on roots, bulbs, grain, nuts, &c. and have general- 
ly a very short tail. 

The Campagnol,^ or short-tailed rat of Pennant, is equally 
destructive ; in some years their numbers are so prodigious, 
that they overflow, as it were, a whole district, and by their 
ravages produce famine and desolation. This effect is stated 
to have been produced in certain parts of France where an ex- 
tent of forty square leagues was devastated by them. In their 
progress these animals are preyed upon by the predaceous 
quadrupeds and birds, by whose incessant attacks their num- 
bers, inordinary seasons, are kept within the bounds assigned 
them by the Creator, as are the Locusts by the Locust-eating 
Thrush,* and the Aphides or Plant-lice which may be denomi- 
nated the Locusts of Britain, and which are stated sometimes 
almost to darken the air, by the ladybirds and aphidivorous 
flies. 

All these migrations are produced by a different cause from 

1 Lemmus vulgaris. 2 Lemmus ccconomus. 

3 Jirvlcola arvalia. 4 Turdus gnjllivorus. 

G 



50 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

those periodical ones which take place, after certain interval?, 
or at certain seasons, in various other animals of every grade; 
and though a scarcity of food, or straitened circumstances or 
accommodations may be the impelling motives, yet these arc 
produced by an unusual increase in the num*ljers of the mi- 
grating species, so that they are driven to seek an outlet by 
whicli their supernumeraries may pass off and relieve them 
from the pressure, or the whole population, deserting an ex- 
hausted country, may establish themselves in better quarters. 

In all the instances that I have here adduced, the object, at the 
first blush, as far as the Deity may be supposed to be concerned 
in these outbreaks, appears rather punitive than beneficent, 
but when we dip below the surface, and look to ultimate con- 
sequences, what appears to be altogether an evil, instead of a 
dark side, turns round and shows one bright with good. It 
is true, in some cases, the object is punishment of an offender, 
and in hopeless cases, the sentence is pronounced, " Cut it down, 
why cumhereth it the ground.''^ But before this, Divine Mercy, 
which willeth not that any should perish, employs those correc- 
tives, which at the same time that they give pain, and wear 
the appearance of evil and punishment, tend to produce that 
change of the mind and conversion of the heart, that will 
reconcile the sinner to God, and ensure to him the blessed 
inheritance of his children. But temporal good, as well as 
spiritual, is often the result of these visitations, the devasta- 
tions of which they are the instruments, as was observed by 
Sparrman of the locusts, are often followed by fertility, and the 
fearful scourge is replaced by Amalthea's horn. 

2. We are next to consider those migrations that take place 
periodically, and usually at certain seasons of every year; the 
general intention of which appears to be a supply of food, and 
often a temperature best suited to reproduction. Providence, 
in this, taking care that their instincts shall stinuilate them to 
change their quarters, when these two objects can be answered 
at the same time, and by a single removal. 

In North America, that ferocious and lion-like animal, the 
Bison,'^ called there the Buffalo, forms regular migrations, in 
immense herds, from north to south, and from the mountains 
to the plains, and after a certain period returns back again. 
Salt-springs, usually called salt-licks or salines, found in a 
clay, compact enough for potter's clay, are much frecpiented 
by these animals, whence they are called Buffalo salt-licks. 
Dr Richardson informs me that the periodical movements of 

1 Bos .Jmcricanus 



MIGRATIONS. 51 

these animals are regulated almost solely by the pastures: 
when a fire has spread over the prairies, it is succeeded b}^ a 
fine growth of tender grass, which they are sure to visit. How 
(he Bison discovers that this has taken place seems not easily 
accounted for; perhaps stragglers from the great herds, when 
food grows scarce, may be instrumental to this. 

The Musk Ox, a ruminating aniiiml between the ox and 
sheep,^ has the same habit, extending its migratory movements 
as far as Melville, ami other islands of the Polar sea, where it 
arrives about tlie middle of May, and going southward towards 
ihe end of September, where it has been seen as low as lat. 67° 
N., which, as Dr Richardson states, approaches the northern 
limit of the Bison : its food, like that of the Rein-deer, called in 
North America the Caribou, is grass in the summer and lichens 
in the winter. Its hair is very long, and, as w^ell as that of the 
Bison, which has been manufactured both in England and 
America into cloth, might be woven into useful articles. This 
animal inhabits strictly the country of the Esquimaux, and may 
be regarded as the gift of a kind Providence to that people, who 
call it Oomingmak, and not only eat its flesh but also the 
contents of its stomach, as well as those of the Rein-deer, 
which they call Norrooks, which consisting of lichens and other 
vegetable substances, as Dr Richardson remarks, are more 
easily digested by the human stomach w^ien they are mixed 
with the salivary and gastric juices of a ruminating animal. 

The wild Rein-deer in North America, in the summer, as 
the excellent man and author lately mentioned states, seek the 
coast of the Arctic seas: it is singular that the females, driven 
from the woods by the musquitoes, migrate thither before the 
males, generally in the month of May (some say in April and 
March), while the latter do not begin their march till towards 
the end of June. At this time the sun has dried up the 
lichens on the Barren Grounds, and tlie moist pastures in the 
valleys of the coast and islands of the above seas afford them 
sufficient food. Soon after their arrival the females drop their 
young. They commence their return to the south in Septem- 
ber, and reach the vicinity of the woods towards the end of 
October. After the rutting season, which takes place in 
September, the males and females live separately; the former 
retire deeper into the woods, while the pregnant herds of the 
latter remain in the skirts of the Barren Grounds, which 
abound in the rein-deer^ and other lichens. In the woods, they 
feed on lichens which hang from the trees, and on the long 

1 Ovihos moschatus. 2 Cawmycc rangiferina. Acliar. 



52 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

grass of the swamps. The males do not usually go so far north 
as the females. Columns, consisting of eight or ten thousand 
of these Caribous, so numerous are they in North America, 
may be seen annually passing from north to south in the 
spring, infested and attacked in their progress by numbers of 
wolves, foxes, and other predaceous quadrupeds, which attack 
and devour the stragglers. 

The Pronged-horned Antelope,^ as well as the Rein-deer, 
appears to go northward in the summer, and return to the 
south in the winter. 

Dr Richardson remarks to me in a letter, — "The Musk-ox 
and Rein-deer feed chiefly on hchens, and therefore frequent 
the Barren Lands and primitive rocks, which are clothed with 
these plants. They resort in winter, when the snow is deep, 
to the skirts of the woods, and feed on the lichens which hang 
from the trees, but on every favourable change of weather they 
return to the Barren Grounds. In summer they migrate to 
the moist pastures on the sea-coast, and eat grass, because the 
lichens on the Barren Lands are then parched by the drought, 
and too hard to be eaten. The young grass is, I suppose, better 
fitted for the fawns, which are dropped about the time the deer 
reach the coast." In all this we see the hand of Providence 
directing them to those places where the necessary sustenance 
my be had. 

The same gentleman has remarked a singular circumstance 
with regard to the American Black Bear.^ In general, this 
species hybernates in the northern parts of the fur countries; 
but it has been observed in certain years, and very severe win- 
ters, that great numbers enter the United States from the 
northward. These were all lean, and generally males. The 
natives assert, that a bear that is not fat cannot hybernate; 
therefore, those that have not acquired sufficient fat when 
winter overtakes them, necessarily emigrate to a milder cli- 
mate.^ 

A migration of an animal of the equine genus was observed 
by Mr. Campbell in South Africa. The Quaii;ga, a kind of 
wild ass, travels in bands of two or thiee hundred, in winter, 
from the tropics southward to a district, in the vicinity of the 
Malalaveen river, reported to be warmer than within the tropic 
of Capricorn, when the sun has retired to the noil hern hemis- 
phere. They stay here for two or three months, which is 
called the Bushmen's harvest. The lions, who follow the 

1 JJntilopc fur rata. 2 l^r.ftis .hnrrirajtiis. 

'.i Faun. Boreal-amcric. i. ](». 



MIGRATIONS. 53 

quaggas, are the chief butchers. During this season, the first 
thing the bushman does, when he awakes, is to see whether 
he can spy any vultures hovering in the heavens at a great 
height; under them lie is sure to find a quagga, which a lion 
has slaughtered in the night. 

But the animals which are most noted for their migrations, 
from a cold to a warm climate, and vice versa, are the birds, 
which, as having dominion in the air, are enabled to transport 
themselves with greater ease, and with the interposition of 
fewer obstacles, than the quadrupeds, the theatre of whose 
motions is the earth, intersected by rivers and mountain ridges, 
which renders their periodical transit less easy to accomplish. 
The number of birds that migrate, if we take Dr Richardson's 
scale, for those of North America, as a rule, compared with 
those that reside the whole year in a country, is about five- 
sixths, a very large proportion ; but as the summer residents are 
replaced by winter ones, the difference is less striking, and the 
desertion less apparent and annoying. The celebrated Dr 
Jenner, in a very ingenious posthumous paper, in the Philoso- 
phical Transactions for 1824, has produced many argument© 
to prove that the periodical migrations of birds are the result, 
not of the approach of the cold or hot seasons, but of the 
absence or presence of a stimulus connected with the original 
law,i " Increase and multiply.^'* That when they feel it they 
seek their summer, and when it ceases its action, their winter 
quarters. In one case, the animal winging its way to a climate 
and country best suited to the great purpose impressed upon it 
by its Creator, of producing and rearing a progeny; and in the 
other returning to a home, most congenial to its nature, and 
best supplying its wants. 

The cause of emigration, in both cases, had previously been 
attributed to the changes of the temperature gradually pro- 
duced by the change of seasons, and the growing scarcity of 
food resulting from it. But Mr Jenner has observed that these 
cannot be the causes that occasion the migration of those birds 
that leave us early in the year, as the cuckoo,^ which disap- 
pears in the beginning of July ; and the swift,^ which takes its 
departure early in the following month. At these times they 
can feel no cold blast to benumb them, and the food that forms 
their usual support is in the greatest abundance. 

There seems to be some analogy between the birds that 
migrate annually to warmer climates to spend their winter^ 

I Cucidus canorus. 2 Cypsdtis apus. 



54 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

and those animals, which remaining in a country, seek a sub- 
terranean, or other close retreat, to shelter them from the 
rigours of that season, and in which they continue in a torpid 
state, till spring revives them and they issue from their hiding- 
places to fulfil the first law of their Creator. Several instances 
also are upon record, even with regard to birds that usually 
migrate, of their having been found torpid in the clefts and 
cavities of trees; and Spallanzani relates experiments which 
prove that swallows can bear a certain degree of cold when 
torpid. I do not recollect any observations which serve to 
prove that hybernating animals are regulated by the tem- 
perature as to the season at which they prepare to retire for 
the winter, except as to insects, which, with few exceptions, 
are of that description. My learned coadjutor, Mr Spence, 
in our Introduction to Entomology^ has some remarks on this 
subject, which seem, at first sight, to prove that the disap- 
pearance of insects, at least those of the Coleoptera order o'^ 
beetles, is not preceded by any remarkable lowering of the 
temperature ; on the contrary, he observed a great ixumber of 
various genera congregating with this view when the ther- 
mometer was fifty-eight degrees in the shade. ^ This was 
about the middle of October. But there is one circumstance 
to which he has not adverted, which may tend to reconcile this 
fact with the received opinion. The nights, at this lime of 
the year are often cold when the days are hot, the latter also 
are much shortened and the former lengthened, so that the 
sum-total of heat received from the sun is very much dimin- 
ished, which may be the exciting cause of their hybernating 
at this time, when the diurnal temperature is so considerable. 

With regard to the sioift, these birds seem to avoid heat, they 
lie by in the middle of the day, and only appear in the morn- 
ing and evening. Their early migration from this country 
may probably be caused by the heat; and Buflbn says that in- 
stead of warmer, they seek colder climates. The house-swal- 
low,^ which remains with us till October, is stated to winter in 
Africa, so that its object is evidently a warmer climate. It is 
remarkable that the birds of this tribe, when they visit us in 
the spring, return to their old haunts. Dr Jenner ascertained 
this by cutting olf two claws from the foot of a certain number, 
several of which were found in the following year, and one 
was met w'\{.\\ after the expiration of seven. The instinct that 
directs these little beings so unerringly across continents and 
oceans, and leads them to their native clime is wonderful, and 

I hiiroil. to lint. li. AX\ 2 Hiruiiilo rtisdcn 



MIGRATIONS. 55 

inexplicable under any other principle than that of Divine su- 
perintendence. But upon this I shall have occasion to enlarge 
hereafter. 

From what is here stated, it seems most probable, that it is 
not only the increasing heat of the southern regions which in- 
duces the swallow to seek a less ardent clime to transact her 
loves and rear her young ; but also a stimulus, caused by the 
heat, acting upon her organization, which aids to accomplish 
that important purpose, and is the leading star by which her 
Creator impels her to the land of her own nativity, and which 
is destined to be that of her offspring. Only the swift leaves 
a colder climate for one more genial and better suited to the 
same purpose, and both return from whence they came, when 
the errand of their voyage is fully accomplished. One sent 
away by too great heat, and the other by a gradual decree- 
men t of the amount of heat, and also of their customary food. 

Vieillot says, that all the swallows do not quit the warm 
countries to which they betake themselves in winter — that 
one part migrates, while another remains stationary, during 
the whole year, in Egypt, Ethiopia, and other tropical coun- 
tries and islands. 

But, besides the insectivorous emigrators, many of the higher 
and more powerful tribes are accustomed to change one coun- 
try for another. When the carcasses of animals putrify, and 
birds multiply under the influence of the northern sun, vul- 
tures, eagles, falcons, hawks, &c. leave the south and go to 
partake of the feasts provided for them in higher latitudes. 

But, besides the birds that visit us during the more genial 
part of the year, and add so greatly to the beauty and music 
of our groves in spring and summer, there are others, and those 
a numerous tribe, that wing hither their way when the reign 
of winter has commenced. The most numerous of these are 
the birds which the Author of nature has fitted to disport them- 
selves and seek their food in the water, or which frequent hu- 
mid and watery places. When the Arctic seas, and lakes, and 
rivers, present an unbroken field of impenetrable ice, the vari- 
ous web-footed birds, the swans^ and geese^ and ducks^ and 
divers,* and coots,^ and an infinity of others, forming their an- 
gular and sometimes triangular phalanxes, each in turn tak- 
ing the lead and first cutting the air,^ fly off, often at a great 
height, to seek in more southern climates, not a region devoid 

1 Cycnus. 2 A user. 

3 Anas. 4 Mergus and Colijmhus. 

5 Fulica. 6 N. Diet. D'Hist. Nat. xx. 544. 



56 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

of the usual concomitants of winter, frost and snow, but where 
their rigours are mitigated, so as to afford to these creatures 
the means of life. Now, also the waders, usually distinguished 
by their long legs and long beaks, as the woodcock,^ the cur- 
lew, and the snipes,^ leave their native marshes and haunts to 
seek others whose unfrozen or partially frozen morasses afford 
them a supply of the worms and vermicles or similar animals 
that form their usual nutriment. Many a time, when a boy, 
I have pursued the field-fare,^ which is one of our winter guests, 
from tree to tree, without its affording me an opportunity of 
taking aim at it, as if it was aware of my purpose, and could 
smell the contents of my musket ; no sooner did I get within 
a couple of hundred yards, than, with all its company, it flew 
a little further, and thus kept tantalizing me for hours, with- 
out my even being able to secure one. These birds, if the 
weather becomes very severe here, are said to fly further south 
in search of food, and to return again. 

Thus, we see the change of seasons brings with it a change 
in the winged inhabitants of every country ; and the winter 
immigration of a vast variety of birds, fit for food and other 
useful purposes, makes up in some degree for the summer or 
autumnal emigration of those, which being constantly before 
our eyes moving in every direction, and rendering vocal every 
grove or 'tree and even the very heavens, entertain our senses 
of seeing and hearing in a most dehghtful manner. Thus, 
also, all countries partake in some degree, by this shifting 
scene of animal life, of the same blessings and pleasures derived 
from the same instruments. 

Though the production and rearing of their young forms a 
principal feature in most of the migrations before noticed, yet 
it is most prominent and conspicuous in the animals, whose 
annual motions I shall next advert to. And here mankind is 
more conspicuously indebted to the fatherly care and bounty 
of a beneficent Providence for a supply of their wants, than in 
any of the cases above detailed ; which most of them minister 
to our pleasures, rather than our sustenance. When the time 
of the singins^ birds is come, and the voice of the nightingale is 
heard in our land ; when the swallow and the swift delight us 
by their rapid and varied motions, now skimming the surface 
of the waters, now darting, cither aloft or with more humble 
llight over the earth ; when the carolling lark ascends towards* 

1 liii^licola viiliiiiris Vieill. Au.imniii^ unjiuitus. — Lath. 

ii ^cutuiniL litdUiMuo (iiul liiillinnhi '.l Tunltuf pUaru 



MIGRATIONS. 57 

heaven, leaching us to look up ami learn fioiu her where to 
direct the best affections of our hearts ; these all excite in us 
delightful sensations, and merit our grateful acknowledgment, 
but still they contribute little or nothing to tlie means of life. 
The locusts indeed, who headed the list of emigrators, at the 
same time that they lay waste a country, supply its inhabitants 
with food, and thus make some recompense for their ravages ; 
and a considerable proportion of the winter birds mentioned 
under the last head, as the swimmers^ and the w^aders,'^ furnish 
our tables with dainty meats; but they come not in such 
numbers as to add materially to the general stock of food, or to 
contribute to the maintenance of the poor, as well as to the 
enjoyments of the rich. The animals I allude to under the 
present head, form the sole food of some nations, and contribute 
a vast and cheap supply, that covers the table of the poor man 
with plenty. The mi grsiting fishes are one of the greatest and 
most invaluable gifts of the Creator to his creature man, by 
which thousands and thousands support themselves, and their 
families ; and which, at certain periods, form the food of mil- 
lions. Of the proceedings of the principal of these fishes, I 
shall now give a brief account. 

I begin with one of the cartilaginous fishes — the Sturgeon. 
There are two noted species of this fish, W' hich is related to the 
shark, the one is called the sturgeon^ by way of eminence, and 
the other the huso.* The latter is found only in the Caspian 
and Black seas, and the Don, the Volga, and other rivers that 
flow into them. It is staled to be much larger than the stur- 
geon : Pallas describes one that weighed 2800 pounds, which 
it is conjectured must have been nearly forty feet long. Its 
ordinary length is stated to be twenty-five feet, ^vhich is the 
maximum of the sturgeon. The numbers of this species far 
exceed those of the latter, the caviar is usually made of its 
spawn, which equals nearly a third of the weight of the whole 
fiish, from whence we may conjecture the infinite number of 
eggs that it contains. Professor Pallas gives a very interesting 
history of the manner in which these enormous fish are taken 
in the Volga, and the Saiek, which discharge their waters into 
the Caspian. And it seems really wonderful that so wild and 
illiterate a people as the Tartars, who have no acquaintance 
with the arts and sciences, should on this occasion, show as 
much genius and invention as the most enlightened nations. 
The huso enters the rivers to spawn earlier than the sturgeon. 

1 Katatores. 2 GraUatores. 

3 Accipenser Sturio 4 Ji. Hvso. 

H 



58 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

generally about mid-wiiUer, when they are still covered with 
ice. At this time the natives construct dikes across the rivers 
in certain parts, formed with piles, leaving no interval that the 
huso can pass through ; in the centre of the dike is an angle 
opening to the current, which consequently is an entering 
angle to the fish ascending the stream ; at the summit of this 
angle is an opening, which leads into a kind of chamber formed 
with cord, or osier hurdles, according to the season of the 5'ear. 
Above the opening is a kind of scaffold, and a little cabin, where 
the fishermen can retire and warm themselves or repose, when 
they are not wanted abroad. No sooner is the huso entered 
into the chamber, which is known by the motion of the water, 
than the fishermen on the scaffold let fall a door, which pre- 
vents its return to seaward, they then by means of ropes and 
puUies lift the movable bottom of the chamber, and easily secure 
the fish. 

Gmelin has related, in a very lively way, the solemn fishing 
which takes place at the beginning of winter, in the neigh- 
bourhood of Astracan, when these fish have retired into vast 
caves under the seashore, which form their winter quarters. A 
great number of fishermen assemble, over whom are placed a 
director and inspectors, who possess considerable authority and 
influence ; every kind of fishing is prohibited, in the places 
known to be the haunt of the husos ; a numerous flotilla of 
boats are in readiness ; every thing is prepared as it were for an 
important military operation ; all approach in concert and with 
regular manoeuvres the asylum in which the fish are concealed, 
the slightest noise is severely interdicted, so that the most pro- 
found silence every where prevails. In an instant, at a given 
signal, a universal shout rends the heavens, which echo mul- 
tiplies on every side. The astonished husos, in the greatest 
alarm, rush from their hiding places, and are taken in nets of 
every kind, prepared to intercept them. 

The huso fishery is of great importance, principally on ac- 
count of the caviar prepared from the roe of these fishes, and 
the isinglass that is made from their air-vessel. The former is 
much in demand amongst many nations, as the Russians, 
Turks, &c.; the Greeks particularly make it almost their sole 
food during their long fasts, and the latter is almost universal- 
ly an article of commerce. The common sturgeon furnishes 
the same articles, as do other fishes also. 

The next kind of fishes that migrate for the purpose of spawn- 
ing, which I shall notice, is one, which though it falls far be- 
hind the sturgeons in size, exceeds them infinitely in numbers 
and dispersion, and in the vast supply of food with which it 



MIGRATIONS. 59 

furnishes the huiiiaa race ; it will readily be seen that I am 
speaking of the Codfish.^ This valuable animal belongs to the 
class of fishes with a bony skeleton, and the tribe of Jugulars, 
or those whose ventral fins are nearer the mouth than the pec- 
toral. It frequents shallows and sandbanks, between the for- 
tieth and sixtieth degrees of North Latitude, both in the Atlan- 
tic and Pacific Oceans, where it is taken in infinite numbers. 
The fishery for it employs both European and American sea- 
men and vessels in abundance. The most celebrated is that 
on the great bank of Newfoundland, where thousands of men 
are employed in catching, salting, and barreUing these fish, 
and whence they are dispersed principally into the Catholic 
countries, where they form a convsiderable portion of the food 
of the people, especially during lent and other fasts. 

The cod-fish makes for the coast at spawning time, going 
northward, this takes place towards the end of winter, or the 
beginning of spring. Leeuwenhoek counted more than nine 
millions of eggs in a cod-fish of the middle size; allowing for 
a large consumption by other fishes which devour them, still 
enough are left, that when hatched produce a superabundant 
supply. They are deposited in the inequalities of the bottom 
amongst the stones. 

The Haddock'^ is another species belonging to this genus, 
which frequents our coast in great numbers in mid-winter; 
they are stated sometimes to form a bank twenty-four miles 
long by three broad. They pursue and devour the herrings, 
and are themselves in their turn devoured by Sharks, which 
follow their shoals. 

The next tribe of migratory fishes is one which supplies our 
tables with a very acceptable successor, when the codfish is out 
of season, and which at last usually becomes so plentiful and 
cheap as to form a part of the poor man's bill of fare, as well 
as of that of his rich neighbour. Every one will see that I 
here allude to the Mackarel.^ This is one of the thoracic fishes, 
or those whose ventral fins are situated below the pectoral. It 
is very widely dispersed, being found in the Arctic, Antarctic, 
and Mediterranean Seas, as well as in the Atlantic Ocean. It 
hybernates in the seas first mentioned, where it is stated to se- 
lect certain depths of the sea called by the natives Barachouas, 
which are so land-locked, that the water is as calm at all times, 
as in tlie most sheltered pools ; the depth of these asylums di- 
minishes in proportion to the proximity of the shore, and the 

1 Gadus Morhua. 2 Gadus (Egclfinus. 

3 Scomber Scombrus. 



60 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

bottom is generally muddy and covered with marine plants. It 
is in these muddy bottoms that the mackarel, directed by their 
instinct, pass the winter. They plunge their head and the an- 
terior part of their body in the mud, keeping their tails elevated 
vertically above it. In the spring they emerge, in infinite 
shoals from their hiding places, and proceed southward for the 
purposes of depositing their eggs in more genial seas ; more 
than half a million of these have been discovered in a single 
female.^ These fish die as soon as they are taken out of the 
water, and then they emit a phosphoric hght. The Scomber 
is one of the fishes, which, according to Pliny, was used for 
making the celebrated Roman pickle named Garum, and he 
calls it a fish good for nothing else ; if he means our mackarel, 
it is singular that its value, as an article of food, should not 
have been discovered. The Garus or Garum derived its name 
from a crustaceous animal so called, from which it was some- 
times made. Apicius is said by Pliny to have employed the 
liver of the mullet in concocting it. 

What the mackarel is to the north of Europe, the Thunny is 
to the south. It deposits its eggs in May and June, when it 
enters the Mediterranean, seeking the shores in shoals arranged 
in the form of a parallelogram, or as some say, a triangle, and 
making a great noise and stir. They appear to have been 
much in request with the Greeks and Romans, and are now 
an important article of food with the inhabitants of the coasts 
and islands of the Mediterranean. 

But no fish is so important a gift of Heaven, as affording 
employment to a large number of individuals both in the catch- 
ing and preparing it, and as adding very largely to the general 
stock of food, especially in Cathohc countries, as that of whose 
history I shall next give a brief sketch. 

Three thousand decked vessels, of different sizes, besides 
smaller boats, are stated to be annually employed in the her- 
ring-fishery, with a proportionable number of seamen, besides 
a vast number of hands that, at certain seasons, are occupied 
in curing them. 

The herring to which I now allude belongs to the tribe called 
abdominal fishes, or those whose ventral fins are behind the pec- 
toral, and may be said to inhabit the arctic seas of Europe, 
Asia, and America, from whence they annually migrate, at 
different times, in search of food and to deposit their spawn. 
Their shoals consist of millions of myriads, and are many 
leagues in width, many fathoms in thickness, and so dense 

I Sfoinhci Vhiinnus. 



MIGRATIONS- 61* 

that the fishes touch each other ; tliey are preceded, at the in- 
terval of some days, by insulated males. The largest and 
strongest are said to lead the shoals, which seem to move in a 
certain order, and to divide into bands as they proceed, visiting 
the shores of various islands and countries, and enriching their 
inhabitants. Their presence and progress are usually indicated 
by various sea-birds, sharks, and other enemies. One of the 
cartilaginous fishes, the sea-ape,^ is said to accompany them 
constantly, and is thence called the king of the herrings. They 
throw ofif also a kind of oily or slimy substance, which extends 
over their columns, and is easily seen in calm weather. This 
substance, in gloomy still nights, exhibits a phosphoric hght, 
as if a cloth, a little luminous, was spread over the sea. 

Some conjecture may be formed of the infinite numbers of 
these invaluable fishes that are taken by European nations from 
what Lacepede relates — that in Norway twenty milHons have 
been taken at a single fishing, that there are few years that 
they do not capture four hundred millions, and that at Gotten- 
burgh and its vicinity seven hundred millions are annually 
taken ; " but what are these millions," he remarks, " to the 
incredible numbers that go to the share of the English, Dutch, 
and other European nations." 

Migrations of these fishes are stated to take place at three 
diflferent times. The first v^hen the ice begins to melt, which 
continues to the end of June ; then succeeds that of the sum- 
mer, followed by the autumnal one, which lasts till the middle 
of September. They seek places for spawning, where stones 
and marine plants abound, against which they rub themselves 
alteiiiately on each side, all the while moving their fins with 
great rapidity. According to Lacepede, William Deukelzoon, 
a fisherman of Biervliet, in Dutch Flanders, was the first per- 
son who salted herrings, this was before the end of the four- 
teenth century ; others attribute this invention to William 
Benckels or Benkelings of Bierulin. To show his sense of the 
importance of this invention, the Emperor Charles V. is stated 
to have visited his tomb, and to have eaten a herring upon his 
grave. The smoking of this valuable fish, we are told, was 
first practised by the inhabitants of Dieppe in Normandy. 

Next to the herring, the pilchard^ is valuable to our own 
country, especially to the inhabitants of Cornwall and Devon- 
shire, to whom this fish is as important as the herring to other 
parts of the kingdom ; they frequent the southern coasts from 
the middle of summer to the end of autumn, and many thou- 

1 Chiituera monstrosa, 2 Clupanodon Pilcardus. 



62 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

sand barrels are annually cured. Lacepede says that, in one 
year, a milliard^ of these fishes has been taken. 

The sprat^ and the anchovy,^ are two other fishes of the 
present tribe, the former, at certain seasons, furnishing a con- 
siderable supply of food to the lower orders, and also a fertil- 
izing kind of manure to the farmer and hop-grower, though, it 
must be confessed, very annoying to the traveller passing 
through a country where it is so employed, by its disagreeable 
stench, and to those who inhabit it by its putrid effluvia, which 
I have known to produce fevers ; the other ministering to the 
enjoyment and luxury of the wealthy by its piquancy when 
pickled, or reduced to an essence ; but on these I shall not 
further enlarge. 

The next tribe of migratory fishes is one whose several species 
are intermediate between marine and fresh-water fishes, roving 
indifferently in the sea, and rivers, and lakes, and thus is fitted 
by Providence to make up to the inhabitants of inland countries 
their distance from the other migrators, by a supply brought, 
as it were, to their very doors. The fishes in question belong 
also to the abdominal class, and form the salmon genus, in- 
cluding the salmon,* the salmon-trout,^ the trout,' the gray- 
ling,'' thecharr,^ the smelt,^ the hucho,"and many other species. 
I shall, however, confine my observations principally to the 
king, as it may be called, of the river migrators, — the Salmon. 
In our own country this noble fish is too high-priced to form 
a general article of food, and may be reckoned amongst the 
luxuries of the rich man's table ; but in others, especially 
amongst some of the North-western American tribes, they are 
gifts of Providence, which form their principal food at all sea- 
sons. One, which Sir George Mackenzie fell in with, in his 
journey from Canada to the Pacific, were perfect Ichthyopha- 
gites, and would touch no other animal food. These people 
construct, with great labour and ingenuity, across their streams, 
salmon weirs, which are formed with timber and gravel, and 
elevated nearly four feet above the level of the water ; beneath 
machines are placed, into which the salmon fall when they 
attempt to leap over the weir. On either side is a large frame 
of timber-work, six feet above the level of the upper water, in 
which passages are left for the salmon, leading into the ma- 

1 One thousand million. 2 Clupca Sprattu^-. 

3 C. encrasicolus. 4 Sal mo Sahir. 

5 ,V. TnMa. 6 5. Fnrin. 

7 S. Thyrtudhus. 8 S. .ilpiiiii.y. 

9 S. Eperlanus. 10 ^. Hucfio 



MIGRATIONS. 63 

chines. When they catch their sahnon they string them and 
suspend them, at first, in the river. The women are employed 
in preparing and cming tliese fish ; for this purpose they ap- 
pear to roast them first, and then suspend them on the poles 
that run along the beams of their houses, in which there are 
usually from three to five hearths, the heat and smoke from 
which contribute, no doubt, to their proper curing. 

The sahnon, indeed, frequents every sea, the arctic as well 
as the equatorial ; it is found even in great lakes and inland 
seas, as the Caspian, into which it is even afifirined to make its 
way by a subterranean channel from the Persian Gulf — it goes 
as far south as New Holland and the Australian seas ; but, it 
is said never to have been found in the Mediterranean, and 
appears to have been unknown to Aristotle. Phny mentions it 
as a river fish, preferred to all marine ones by the inhabitants 
of Gaul. It traverses the whole length of the largest rivers. 
It reaches Bohemia by the Elbe, Switzerland by the Rhine, 
and the Cordilleras of America by the mighty Maragnon, or 
River of Amazons, whose course is more than three thou- 
sand miles. In temperate climates the salmon quits the sea 
early in the spring, when the waves are driven by a strong 
wind against the river currents. It enters the rivers of France 
in the beginning of the autumn, in September ; and in Kamt- 
schatka and North America still later. In some countries 
this is called the salmon wind. They rush into rivers that 
are freest from ice, or where they are carried by the highest 
tide, favoured by the wind ; they prefer those streams that 
are most shaded. They leave the sea in numerous bands, 
formed with great regularity. The largest individual, which 
is usually a female, takes the lead, and is followed by others 
of the same sex, two and two, each pair being at the distance 
of from three to six feet from the preceding one ; next come 
the old, and after them the young males in the same order. 

The noise they make in their transit, heard from a distance, 
sounds like a far oflf storm. In the heat of the sun and in 
tempests, they keep near the bottom ; at other times they swim 
a little below the surface. In fair weather they move slowly, 
sporting as they go at the surface, and wandering again and 
again from their direct route ; but when alarmed they dart 
forward with such rapidity that the eye can scarcely follow 
them. They employ only three months in ascending to the 
sources of the Maragnon, the current of which is remarkably 
rapid, which is at the rate of nearly forty miles a day ; in a 
smooth stream or lake, their progress would increase in a four- 
fold ratio. Their tail is a very powerful organ, and its mus- 
cles have wonderful energy ; by placing it in their mouth they 



64 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

make of it a very elastic spring, for letting it go with violence 
they raise themselves in the air to the height of from twelve 
to fifteen feet, and so clear the cataract that impedes their 
course ; if they fail in their first attempt, they continue their 
efforts till they have accomphshed it. The female is stated to 
hollow out a long and deep excavation in the gravelly bed of 
the river to receive her spawn, and when deposited to cover it 
up, but this admits of some doubt. 

Amongst the migrations of fishes, I must not neglect those 
that take place in consequence of the water in the ponds or 
pools that they inhabit being dried up : some of these are very 
extraordinary, and prove that when the Creator gave being lo 
these animals, he foresaw the circumstances in which they 
would be placed, and mercifully provided them with means of 
escape from dangers to which they were necessarily exposed. 

In very dry summers, the fishes that inhabit the above situ- 
ations, are reduced often to the last extremities, and endeavour 
to relieve themselves by plunging, first their heads, and after- 
wards their whole bodies, in the mud to a considerable depth ; 
and so, though many in such seasons perish, some are pre- 
served till a rainy one again supplies them with the element 
so indispensable to their life. Carp, it is known, may be kept 
and fed a very long time in nets in a damp cellar, a faculty 
which fits them for retaining their vitahty when they bury 
themselves at such a depth as to shelter them from the heat. 

But others, when reduced to this extremity, desert their na- 
tive pool, and travel in search of another that is better supplied 
with water. This has long been known of eels, which wind, by 
night, through the grass in search of water, when so circum- 
stanced. Dr Hancock, in the Zoological Journal, gives an 
account of a species of fish, called, by the Indians, the Flat- 
head Hassar, and belonging to a genus* of the family of the 
Siluridans, which is instructed by its Creator, when the pools, 
in which they commonly reside, in very dry seasons, lose their 
water, to take the resolution of marching by land in search of 
others in which the water is not evaporated. These fish grow 
to about the length of a foot, and travel in large droves with 
this view ; they move by night, and their motion is said to be 
like that of the two-footed lizard.^ A strong serrated arm con- 
stitutes the first ray of its pectoral fin." Using this as a kind 

1 Doras. iJ Bipes. 

3 l^T,ATE Xir. Fio. 1. is a species of Callictlnjs, a fish of the sajne Iwibits 
wit)i the Doras. B'in. '2. is tli(« pectoral ray of another Sihiridnn, which was 
dug up in a villaac nenr Harhinu. b\il wliich is not h fossil bon«* 



MIGRATIONS. 65 

of foot, it should seem, they push themselves forwards, by 
means of their elastic tail, moving nearly as fast as a man will 
leisurely walk. The strong plates which envelope their body, 
probably, facilitate their progress, in the same maimer as those 
under the body of serpents, which in some degree perform the 
office of feet. It is affirmed by the Indians, that they are fur- 
nished with an internal supply of water sufficient for their jour- 
ney, which seems confirmed by the circumstance that their 
bodies when taken out of the water, even if wiped dry with a 
cloth, become instantly moist again. Mr Campbell, a friend 
of Dr Hancock's, resident in Essequibo, once fell in with a 
drove of these animals, which were so numerous, that the In- 
dians filled several baskets with them. 

Another migrating fish was found by thousands in the ponds 
•and all the fresh waters of Carolina, by Bosc ; and as these 
pools are subject to be dry in summer, the Creator has furnished 
this fish, as well as one of the flying ones,^ by means of a 
membrane which closes its mouth, with the faculty of living 
out of water, and of travelling by leaps, to discover other pools. 
Bosc often amused himself with their motions when he had 
placed them on the ground, and he found that they always 
direct themselves towards the nearest water, which they could 
not possibly see, and which they must have discovered by some 
internal index ; during their migrations they furnish food to 
numerous birds and reptiles. They belong to a genus of 
abdominal fishes,^ and are called swampines. It is evident 
from this statement that these fishes are both fitted by their 
Creator, not only to exist, but also move along out of the water, 
and are directed by the instinct implanted by him, to seek the 
nearest pool that contains that element ; thus furnishing a 
strong proof of what are called compensating contrivances ; 
neither of these fishes have legs, yet the one can walk and the 
other leap without them, by other means with which the Su- 
preme Intelligence has endowed it. I may here observe that 
the serrated bone, or first ray of the pectoral fin, by the assist- 
ance of which the flat-head appears to move, is found in other 
Siluridans, which leads to a conjecture that these may some- 
times also move upon land. 

Another fish,^ found by Daldorff, in Tranquebar, not only 
creeps upon the shore, but even climbs the Fan palm* in pur- 
suit of certain Crustaceans which form its food. The struc- 
ture of this fish peculiarly fits it for the exercise of this re- 

1 Exocatus. 2 Hijdrargyra. 

3 Perca scandeiis. 4 Borassus Jiabelliformis. 



66 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

markable instinct. Its body is lubricated with slime which 
facilitates its progress over the bark, and amongst its chinks ; 
its gill-covers are armed with numerous spines, by which, used 
as hands, it appears to suspend itself; turning its tail to the 
left, and standing, as it were, on the little spines of its anal fin, 
it endeavours to push itself upwards by the expansion of its 
body, closing at the same time its gill-covers, that they may 
not prevent its progress ; then expanding them again it reaches 
a higher point ; thus, and by bending the spiny rays of its dorsal 
fins to right and left, and fixing them in the bark, it continues 
its journey upwards. The dorsal and anal fins can be folded 
up and received into a cavity of the body. 

How exactly does this structure fit it for this extraordinary 
instinct. These fins assist it in certain parts of its route, and, 
when not employed, can be packed up so as not to hinder its 
progress. The lobes of its gill-covers are so divided and armed 
as to be employed together, or separately, as hands, for the 
suspension of the animal, till, by fixing its dorsal and anal fins, 
it prepares itself to take another step ; all showing the Supreme 
Intelligence and Almighty hand that planned and fabricated 
its structure, causing so many organs, each in its own way, to 
assist in promoting a common purpose. The fan palm, in which 
this animal was taken by Daldorff, grew near the pool inhabited 
by these fishes. He makes no mention, however, of their 
object in these terrestrial excursions; but Dr Virey observes 
that it is for the sake of small Crustaceans, on which they feed. 

I shall name only one more animal that migrates for the 
great purpose of reproduction, and this is not the least interest- 
ing of them ; and, though it does not furnish so large a supply 
of food to the countries it passes through, as the migratory 
fishes, still it is useful in that respect : the animal I allude to 
is the land-crab. 

Several, indeed, of the crabs forsake the waters for a time, 
and return to them to cast their spawn; but the most cele- 
brated of all is that known by the above appellation, and alluded 
to by Dr Paley, under the name of the violet crab, and which 
is called by French the tourlourou.^ These crabs are natives 
of the West Indies and South America. In May and June, 
when the rainy season takes place, their instinct impels them 
to seek the sea, that they may fulfil the great law of their 
Creator, and cast their spawn. 

They descend the mountains, which are their usual abode, 
in such numbers, that the roads and woods are covered with 

1 Gecareinus carnife^t. 



I 



MIGRATIONS. 67 

them. They feel an impulse so to steer their course, that they 
may travel by the easiest descent, and arrive most readily at 
the sea, the great object at which they aim. They resemble 
a vast army marching in battle array, without breaking their 
ranks, following always a right line; they scale the houses, 
and surmount every other obstacle that lies in their way. 
They sometimes even get into the houses, making a noise like 
that of rats, and when they enter the gardens they commit 
great devastations, destroying all their produce with their 
claws. They are said to halt twice every day, and to travel 
chiefly in the night. Arrived at the sea-shore, they are there 
reported to bathe three or four diflfereiU times; when retiring 
to the neighbouring plains, or woods, they repose for some 
time, and then the females return to the water, and commit 
their eggs to the waves. This business dispatched, they en- 
deavour to regain, in the same order, the country they had 
left, and by the same route, but only the most vigorous can 
reach the mountains. The greater part are so weak and lean, 
that they are forced to stop to recruit their strength in the first 
country they reach. When arrived again at their habitations, 
they have a new labour to undergo, for now is the time of 
their moult. They hide themselves in their subterranean 
retreats for ttiis purpose, so that not a single one can be seen : 
they even stop up the mouth of their burrows. Some writers, 
however, affirm that they change their shells immediately 
after their oviposition. 

The respiration of these land-crabs, for a long time, had 
puzzled comparative anatomists. — They could not explain how 
animals, breathing by gills, could subsist so long out of the 
water without these organs becoming useless. M. M. Au- 
douin, however, and Milne Edwards, cleared up the mystery 
by the discovery of a kind of trough, formed by the folds 
which line and constitute the parieles of the branchial cavity, 
and destined to contain and preserve a certain quantity of 
water proper to moisten the gills. One species^ has more than 
one pocket, or vesicle, filled with that fluid. This trough 
exists in the horsemen land-crabs,'^ but it is smaller, and a 
spongy mass furnishes the requisite moisture. The gills of 
the land-crabs, in other respects, do not differ from those of 
the tribe in general. God, when he formed these animals, 
would not separate them from their kind by a different mode 
of respiration, but by this compensating contrivance he fitted 
them for the circumstances in which he decreed to place them, 
and for a long sojourn out of the water. 

1 Gecarcinus Uca. 2 Ocypode. 



68 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

What, is the great object of this law of the Creator, that im- 
pels them to seek, in many cases, a mountain retreat, at a dis- 
tance from the ocean, which forms the hquid atmosphere fitted 
to the great body of the Crustaceans, has not hitherto, for want 
of sufficient and accurate details of their history, been made 
fully obvious. When insects leave the waiers to become deni- 
zens of the earth and air, the object appears evidently an in- 
crease of food, not only for terrestrial animals, whether moving 
on the one or in the other, but to multiply even that of the in- 
habitants of the waters. When the day-flies^ burst in such 
myriads from the banks of rivers which they inhabited in their 
first state, the fishes are all in motion, and often jump from the 
water to catch the living flakes that are every moment descend- 
ing. When in the water, or under it, these animals and the 
may-flies are defended, or concealed from the fishes, and there- 
fore are not so easy to come at; but now is their harvest, and 
when they drop their eggs, they fall towards the stream, and 
it is deemed a shower of manna. 

The same object brings the several kinds of land-crabs at 
stated times to sea, to deposit their eggs where their young may 
reach a certain maturity, if not undergo a metamorphosis ; 
probably at this period there is an assemblage of aquatic de- 
vourers of Crustaceans, to share in the expected harvest. And 
during the route of the myriads that thus migrate to the sea, 
beasts and birds, and man himself, all partake of the feast thus 
provided for them. 

If we give this subject of the migration of animals due con- 
sideration, and reflect what would be the consequence if rK) 
animals ever changed their quarters, we shall find abundant 
reason for thankfulness to the Almighty Father of the universe, 
for the care he has taken of his whole family, and of his crea- 
ture man in particular, consulting not only his sustentation 
and the gratification of his palate by multiplying and varying 
his food, but also that of his other senses, by the beauty, mo- 
tions, and music of the animals that are his summer or winter 
visiters: did the nightingale forsake our groves, the swallow 
our houses and gardens, the cod-fish, mackarel, salmon, and 
herring our seas, and all the other animals that occasionally 
visit us their several haunts, how vast would be the abstrac- 
tion from the pleasure and comfort of our lives. 

By means of these migrations, the profits and enjoyments 
derivable from the animal creation are also more equally di- 
vided, at one season visiting the south, and enlivening their 

1 Eiihcmcni. 



MIGRATIONS. 69 

winter, and at another adding to the vernal and summer de- 
lights of the inhabitant of the less genial regions of the north, 
and making up to him for the privations of winter. Had the 
Creator so willed, all these animals might have been organized 
so as not to require a warmer or a colder climate for the breed- 
ing or rearing of their young : but his will was, that some of 
his best gifts should thus oscillate, as it w^ere, between two 
points, that the benefit they conferred might be more widely 
distributed, and not become (he sole property of the inhabitants 
of one chmate : thus the swallow gladdens the sight both of 
the Briton and the African ; and the herring visits the coasts, 
and the salmon the rivers of every region of the globe. What 
can more strongly mark design, and the intention of an all- 
powerful, all-wise, and beneficent Being, than that such a va- 
riety of animals should be so organized and circumstanced as 
to be directed annually, by some pressing want, to seek dis- 
tant climates, and, after a certain period, to return again to 
their former quarters ; and that this instinct should be produc- 
tive of so much good to mankind, and, at the same tinae, be 
necessary, under its present circumstances, for the preserva- 
tion or propagation of the species of these several animals. 

There is another view that may be taken of this subject, 
equally showing the attention of the Almighty Father to the 
wants of every description of his creatures. The migrating 
tribes of almost every kind are attended by numerous bands of 
predaceous animals, which, as well as man, partake in the 
general harvest; the bears, wolves, foxes, dogs, and, in tropi- 
cal countries, other beasts of prey, hang on the flanks of the 
bands of emigrators, and capture and devour the stragglers. 
The vultures, and other carnivorous birds, follow and share in 
the spoil : and the emigrating fishes are attended by whole 
tribes of predaceous birds and fishes, which thin their numbers 
before they are taken by the nets of the fisherman. 



I AM next to say something on the local distribution of ani- 
mals. By their local distribution, I mean their station in any 
given country. Under this head they may be divided into ter- 
restrial, amphibious, and aquatic. 

The local distribution of terrestrial animals is very diversified. 
Some inhabit the loftiest mountains, here the eagle builds its 
aerie, and the condor* deposits its eggs on the bare rock; and 

1 Sarcorhamphus Gryphus. 



70 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

here the chamois^ often laughs at the efforts of the hunter, as- 
tonishing him by the ease with which it scours over the rocks, 
or with which it ascends or descends the most inaccessible pre- 
cipices. 

Some animals, that in high latitudes are found in the plains, 
in a warmer atmosphere seek the mountains. Of this descrip- 
tion is the beautiful Apollo butterfly,^ which, in Sweden is very 
common in the country and gardens about Upsal, while in 
France it is found only on mountains between three and four 
thousand feet above the level of the sea. I received very fine 
specimens collected by a friend in the Pyrenees. The common 
viper^ also, which in noithern Europe is found in the plains, in 
southern is found only on Alpine or Subalpine mountains. 

It has been obser^-ed by an ingenious and learned writer, that 
the terrestrial globe seems to be formed of two immense moun- 
tains, set base to base at the equator, and that upon each of 
these hemispheres the vegetables and animals are generally 
placed in parallel zones, according to the degree of heat or cold. 
The exceptions to this rule, he further observes, are easy to be 
appreciated, and confirms its truth, since the mountains, the 
various elevations and depressions of the country, which even 
under the same parallel modify the ordinary temperature, pro- 
duce vegetables, and often animals, analogous to their several 
degrees of heat or cold. The lofty mountains in tropical coun- 
tries, exhibit from their base to their snow-clad summits, the 
same gradation as these hemispheres present in going from the 
equator towards the poles. 

The majority, however, of animals do not ascend such 
heights, but seek their subsistence in the plains, and less ele- 
vated regions ; yet here a considerable difference obtains ac- 
cording to the nature of the soil and country. The vast sandy 
desarts of Africa and Asia, the Steppes of Tartary, the Llanos 
and Pampas of South America have their peculiar population ; 
in the former the camel, and his master (he Arab, whose great 
wealth he constitutes, are indigenous; in tlie latter the horse 
and the Tartar who rides and eats him ; or the Hispano-Ame- 
rican, and the herds of horses and oxen, returned to their wild 
and primitive type, w^ho snares them with his lasso, and re- 
duces them again to the yoke of man. Numerous also are the 
peculiar animal productions to which different soils afford sub- 
sistence. The sea-shore, sandy and barren wastes, \iood.s and 
forests, arable lands, pasture, meadow and marsh, all arc ihus 

J Jltitilopc Rupicapra. '2 ranws.sius .Ipollo. 

3 Coluber bcrus. 



LOCAL. ' 71 

distinguished ; every plant almost is inhabited by insects ap- 
propriated to it, every bird has its peculiar parasite or louse;* 
and not only are the living animals so infested, but their car- 
casses are bequeathed to a numerous and varied army of dis- 
seclers, who soon reduce them to a naked skeleton; nay, their 
very excrements become the habitation of the grubs of sundry 
kinds of beetles and flies. 

But not only is the surface of the earth and its vegetable 
clothing, thickly peopled with animals, but many, even quad- 
rupeds and reptiles, as well as insects and worms, are subter- 
ranean, and seek for concealment in dens, caves and caverns, 
or make for themselves burrows and tortuous paths at various 
depths under the soil, or seek for safety and shelter, by lurking 
under stones or clods, and all the dark places of the earth. 

To other animals, in order to pass gradually from such as are 
purely terrestrial, to those that are aquatic, Providence has 
given the privilege to frequent both the earth and the icaier ; 
some of which may be regarded as belonging to the former, 
and frequenting the latter, as water fowl of various kinds, the 
amphibious rat,^ the architect beaver,^ many reptiles, and 
some insects ; otliers again as belonging to the latter, and fre- 
quenting the former ; for instance, the sea-otter,* and the dif- 
ferent kinds of seaP and morse,^ the turtle,'' the penguin,^ 
several insects,^ and the water-newts. ^° Other amphibious 
animals, if they may be so called, are aquatic at one period of 
their life, and terrestrial at another; this is particularly exem- 
plified in some insects, thus the grubs of w^ater-beetles,^^ those 
of dragon-flies,*^ may-flies,*^ ephemeral-flies,^* water-moths," 
gnats or mosquitos,*^ and several other two-winged flies, live 
in the water, while the perfect insect is either amphibious as 
the beetle, or terrestrial as the remainder. 

But no part of this terraqueous globe is more fully peopled, 
and with a greater variety and diversity of beautiful, or strange, 
or monstrous forms, than the waters, from the infinite ocean to 
the most insignificant pool or puddle. Every part and portion 
of the supposed element of water ; nay, almost every drop of 
that fluid teems with life. Thousands of aquatic species are 



1 


Mrmus. 


2 


Lemmiis amphihius. 


3 


Castor Fiber. 


4 


Enhydra marina. 


5 


Phoca. 


6 


Trichechus. 


7 


Ckelonia Mydas. 


8 


Aptenodytes. 


9 


Dyticus, Gijrinus, Ranatra, &c. 


10 


SalamandrcB aqtuOica 


11 


DyticidfE. Hydrophilida, Gyrinida. 


12 


Libellulina. 


13 


Trichoptera. 


H 


EphemeridtB. 


L5 


Hydrorampa. 


16 


Culex. 



72 GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 

known, but myriads of myriads never have been seen and 
never will be seen by the eye of man. 

Amongst those that inhabit fluids, none are more wonderful 
than those that are termed Infusories ;^ because they are usu- 
ally found in infusions of various substances, &c. ; when dry, 
these animals lose all signs of life, but upon immersion, even 
after the lapse of years, they immediately awake from their 
torpor and begin to move briskly about. Even the air, accord- 
ing to Spallanzani, seems to contain the germs or eggs of 
these infinitesimals of creation, so that we swallow them when 
we breathe, as well as when we drink. 

With respect to animals more entirely aquatic, some inhabit, 
as the majority of sea-fishes and animals, salt waters only, 
some salt at one time and fresh at another, as the species of 
the salmon genus, the sturgeon, &c. ; and some frequent 
brackish waters, as some flat-fish, and shell-fish. 

The bed of the mighty ocean is not only planted with a 
variety of herbs, which afford pasture to many of its animal 
inhabitants, but it has other productions which represent a forest 
of trees and shrubs, and are, strictly speaking, the first mem- 
bers of the zoological world, connecting it with the vegetable; 
these are denominated Zoophytes or animal plants, and Poly- 
pes (Polypus), This last name has been adopted from Aris- 
totle ; with him however and the ancients, it is evidently used 
to designate the Argon aut^ and Nautilus of the moderns, and 
also to include some terrestrial shells. The Zoophytes how- 
ever are not confined to the ocean, every rivulet, and stagnant 
ditch or pool affords to some kinds, more commonly denom- 
inated Polypes, and also to some sponges, their destined habi- 
tation. An infinite army of shell-fish, whether multivalve, 
bivalve, or univalve, also cover the bed of the ocean, or move 
in its waters, and some dance gaily on its surface with ex- 
panded sails, or dashing oars when tempted by fair weather. 

From this brief view of the local distribution of animals and 
their various haunts, we see the care of Divine Providence, 
that no place, however, at first sight, apparently unfit, might 
be without its animal as well as vegetable population : if the 
hard rock is clothed with a lichen, the lichen has its inhab- 
itant: and that inhabitant, besides affording an appropriate 
food to the bird that alights upon the rock, or some parasite 
that has been hatched in or upon its own body, assists in form- 
ing a soil upon it. There is no place so liorriblc and feiid 

1 Infusoria, Jhriia, Jlgastria, Jlvwrp/ia, Minflscopica. 

2 Argononld. 



LOCAL. 73 

from unclean and putrid substances, tliat is not cleansed and 
purified by some animals tbat are either its constant or noma- 
dic inhabitants. Thus life, a life attended in most cases, if 
not all, with some enjoyment, swarms every where — in the 
air, in the earth, under the earth, in the waters — there is no 
place in which the will of an Almighty Creator is not executed 
by some being that hath animal life. What Power is mani- 
fested in the organization and structure of these infinite hosts 
of existences ! what Wisdom in their adaptation to their several 
functions! and what Goodness and stupendous Love in that 
universal action upon all these different and often discordant 
creatures compelhng them, while they are gratifying their own 
appetites or passions, and following the lead of their several 
instincts, to .promote the good of the whole system, combining 
into harmony almost universal discord, and out of seeming 
death and destruction bringing forth life and health and uni- 
versal joy ! He who, as an ancient writer speaks, " Contains 
all things,"^ can alone thus act upon all things, and direct 
them in all their ways to acknowledge him by the accomplish- 
ment of each wise and beneficient purpose of his will. Philo 
Judae'us, in his book upon agriculture,^ speaking of those words 
of the Psalmist, " The Lord is my shepherd, therefore can Hack 
nothing,''^ has the following sublime idea, illustrative of this 
subject. " God, like a shepherd and king, leads, according to 
right and law, the earth, and the water, and the air, and the 
fire, and whatever plants or animals are therein, things mortal 
and things divine ; the physical structure also of the heavens, 
and the circuit of the sun and moon ; the revolutions and har- 
monious choirs of the other stars ; placing over them his right 
Word the first born Son, who hath inherited the care of this 
Holy Flock, as the Viceroy of a mighty King." 

1 Hennas. 2 Uipt yicepyiac 152. A. Ed, Col Mlob. 



CHAPTER III. 

Functions and Instincts of Animals. 

Having, in the last chapter, stated liovv the dispersion and 
distribution of animals, under the Divine superintendence and 
direction, probably took place after the Deluge ; and havinj^ 
likewise considered those temporary changes of place, either 
casual or periodical, which are still in operation, 1 shall next 
endeavour to give a general sketch of the animal kingdom, lis 
classes and larger groups, and so much of their history, habits, 
and instincts, as may be necessary to indicate their several 
functions and offices in the general plan of creation, so as to 
illustrate more strikingly the Goodness that willed, the Wis- 
dom that planned, and the Power that executed the wondrous 
whole ; so that each in its place and station, by employing the 
faculties and organs, with which he has gifted it, in accom- 
plishing his will, praises, though unconsciously, its Almighty 
and Beneficent Creator, thus loudly calling upon man, the 
rational head of the creation, to take up the strain and lead 
the general choir. 

Before 1 descend to particulars, I must say a few words upon 
the general functions of the animal kingdom. These, like 
JanuSj have a double aspect ; — on one side they aflect the 
vegetable world, and on the other their own body. 

There is a singular contrast and contrariety between the 
majority of animals and vegetables. The head of the animal 
and the root or base of the vegetable perform the same ofiice, 
that of collecting and absorbing the nutriment of each. The 
animal derives this nutriment from organic matter, the vegeta- 
ble from inorganic. The plant gives oxygen to the heaven, 
and falling leaves and other matters to the earth. The ani- 
mal gives nitrogen to the former, and the rejectamenta of iis 
food to the latter. The most beautiful and admired, and odor- 
ous and elevated parts of the plant arc its rejiroductive organs 
and their appendages, while in the animal they arc the very 
reverse of this. 

But, in all this, wc see the wisdom and forethought of the 
Creator. Wc sec how exactly, by this nuilual inversion, each 



' FUNCTIONS AND 1N?.TINCTR 75 

class of beings is filled for ils stalion and functions. The 
plant to take root in, invest and ornament the eartli, and keep 
ihe atmosphere pure by a constant supply of vital air ; the ani- 
mal to browse and trim the vegetable, and by checking its 
hixuriance promote its welfare, to furnish it with a product 
calculated for its health and necessar}^ to its existence ; and by 
I he manure, various in kind as the animals themselves, which 
it produces, supplying to the earth fresh pabulum for its vege- 
table tribes, and making good what it lost by the exhaustion, 
occasioned by the infinite myriads that, investing it on all 
sides like a garment, derive their nutriment from it, some 
plunging deep, and others, as it were, skimming the surface : 
if we contrast this with the returns they make, we shall be 
convinced that, in this case, the expenditure would vastly ex- 
ceed the income, and that a class of beings was essentially 
necessary as a counterpoise, which, by taking little or nothing 
immediately from the soil, at the same time that they added 
to it, some in a grealer and some in a less degree, might afford 
a sufficient supply of those principles which are indispensably 
requisite for the due nutriment and development of the vari- 
ous members of the vegetable kingdom, and thus maintain an 
equilibrium, and make good the deficiency just stated. 

There is another function which is devolved upon animals 
with respect to the vegetable kingdom ; to keep the members 
of it within due limits, and to hinder them from encroaching 
too much upon each other. All organized beings have a na- 
tural tendency to increase and multiply; and while there is 
space this tendency is beneficial; but when plants or animals 
exceed certain limits, they stand in each other's way, and pre- 
vent all further growth or healthy progress. The herbivorous 
animals, in various ways, serve as a countercheck to this tend- 
ency, and keep the vegetable tribes from encroaching too much 
upon each other. As I have detailed the effects of this when 
I spoke of the ravages of the locusts, and shall have occasion 
again to notice it, I shall not now enlarge further upon it. 

I am next to consider another general function of animals, 
or the effects they produce upon their own body : and here the 
reason just alluded to, their constant tendency to multiply so 
as to be injurious to each other, and also to vegetable produc- 
tions, especially those that are important to man or beast, 
which in the present state of things is so constantly recurring, 
renders it necessary that some bounds should be set to their 
increase, which Providence effects by letting them loose against 
each other. The great object of the Creator is the mainte- 
nance of the whole system of cieation in order and beauly, and 



76 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

this he is pleased to accomplish, not always by the concord but 
by the seeming discord of the agents he employs. 

When we take a first view of nature we are struck by a 
scene which seems to be one of universal conflict, for the very 
heavens appear not clear from the charge : the philosopher 
who studies them tells us of antagonist powers, that are per- 
petually striving with each other, the one to absorb all things 
in a common centre, the other to dissever them, and scatter 
them in illimitable space^ and when we turn to the earth, 
what a scene of destruction is before ns ! The king of the 
terrestrial globe, man, constantly engaged in a struggle with 
his fellow man, often laying waste the earth, slaughtering its 
inhabitants, and deforming its productions — his subjects of the 
animal kingdom following the example of their master, and 
pitilessly destroying each other — the strong oppressing the 
weak, and most seeming bent to annihilate the races to which 
they are opposed ; so that, humanly speaking, in the lapse of 
ages, we might expect that one species of animals would be 
annihilated after another, till the whole were obliterated from 
the face of creation, and the sublime language of the prophet 
literally verified ; " / beheld the earth, and, lo, it was without fonn 
and void; and the heavens, and they had no light. I beheld the 
mountains, and, lo, they trembled, and all the hills moved lightly. 
I beheld, and, lo, there was no man, and all the birds of the air 
were fled." 

But if, with our spirits depressed, by the prospect of so uni- 
versal a scene of mutual struggles and destruction, we listen 
again to the philosopher, he will tell us that the ceaseless 
struggle of the antagonist powers of the heavens prevents, in- 
stead of causing disorder and confusion, that by the powerful 
and mutual counteraction of these mighty opponents, all the 
heavenly bodies of our system are prevented from rushing to 
the centre, or being driven, dispersed into their atoms, beyond 
the flammantia mcenia mundi; that thus tlieir annual and diur- 
nal revolutions are maintained, that each observes its appointed 
course, keeps its assigned station, and ministers to tlie good 
and well-being of the whole system. If then we turn our 
view again to the earth, and take a nearer survey of things — 
if we consider the present tendency to multiply, beyond mea- 
sure, of all things that have life, we shall soon be convinced 
that, unless tliis tendency was met by some check, the world 
of animated beings would be perpetually encroaching upon 
each otluir, and would linally perish for want of sullicicnt 
food; and that the parlial evils inllictcd by one individual or 
one class upon another, to borrow a (erm from ihe l*oli(ical 



FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 77 

Economist, proportions the demand to the supply; that thus 
hoth vegetables and animals are so accurately distributed, 
weighed so nicely against each other, as never to go a step 
heyond what God decrees, and what is most beneficial to the 
whole system; and that the actual number of every kind bears 
due relation to the work it has to do; and, upon closer inquiry, 
we find, that though since the creation, probably in conse- 
quence of the great change in the moral state of the world, 
superinducing physical changes also, some species no longer 
necessary may have perished, yet that, in general, they have 
maintained their ground from age to age, in spite of the at- 
tacks of the great army of destroyers. To maintain things in 
this state, thus to ^^ order all things in measure, number, and 
weight,"^^ as the wise man speaks, to cause all so to harmonize, 
and so out of death and destruction to bring forth life, indi- 
cates still more strongly the constant and wise superintend- 
ence, and powerful arm of a watchful Providence, and de- 
monstrates irrefragably that there is a Great Being constantly 
at work, either mediately or immediately, to produce effects 
that, without his constant superintendence and intervention, 
could never take place. And thus, as sings the bard of 
Twickenham, 

"All nature is but art unknown to thee, 
All chance direction which thou canst not see, 
All discord harmony not understood, 
All partial evil, universal good." 



CHAPTER IV. 



Functions and Instincts of the Infusory Animals. 

As at the original creation of the animal kingdom, it was the 
will of the Supreme Being to begin at the foot of the scale and 
to terminate with man, who was at its summit, thus making a 
gradual progress towards the most perfect being it was his will 
to create, and ending w^ith him: so I think it will best mani- 
fest his power and perfections if I endeavour to trace out the 
footsteps of the Deity in the same direction as he proceeded ; 
and instead of beginning, as is usually done by systematical 
writers, with the highest grade of animals, if I ascend upwards 
from the lowest. 

Our first inquiry must be what are these lowest animals? 
And are there any organized bodies that partake of two na- 
tures, that are either animal at one period of their existence and 
vegetable at another, or else are partly animal and partly vege- 
table? These doubtful forms must be sought for amongst 
what have been denominated first-plants'^ and first-animals ;^ 
amongst the former is a certain genus or tribe^ of plants, which 
are distinguished not only by their simple structure, but also 
by an oscillatory movement which seems to connect them, in 
some degree, with the animal kingdom. When collected in 
masses they resemble a piece of green velvet. Some cover 
considerable spots in moist places ; others live in the water, 
either fixed to substances contained in it, or floating on the 
surface. They are generally based on a mucilaginous sub- 
stance, the remains of those that, having fulfilled their func- 
tions, are become a caput mortuum. The filaments of which 
the living plant is composed continually oscillate from right to 
left, or from left to right, but very irregularly, some going in 
one direction, others in another; some remaining stationary 
while others continue in motion. 

Professor Agardh inclines to the opinion that these oscillat- 
ing plants owe their existence to difTcrent species of animalcules, 
which at first swim about as animals, and afterwards fix thein- 

1 Protophyta. 2 Protozoa. '.J Oscilhitorur. Vauch. 



INFUSORIES. 79 

selves as plants. This opinion has been adopted by others ; 
and lately Mr Unger has stated that he has seen animated 
particles separate from the parent plant, in a few hours con- 
verted into globules of vegetable matter, v^hich subsequently 
became plants perfectly similar to the individual from which 
they were produced. 

But surely the motions of these seeds or germs, may be 
merely mechanical, and may be necessary to enable them 
properly to fix themselves, somewhat analogous to those me- 
chanical contrivances by which the seeds of numerous plants, 
as those of the dandelion and cranesbill, are transported to a 
distance and enabled to enter the soil and fix themselves in it. 

That any creature should begin life as an animal and end it 
as a plant seems to contradict the general analogy of creation, 
and requires much stronger proofs than appear to have been 
adduced in the present case, before it can be admitted. The 
motions of the oscillating plants are not very different from 
those of the stamina of some, and of the leaves of others, as 
the Hedysarum gyrans; yet Adanson has proved that the vi- 
brations of the filaments are the same both in hot and cold 
weather, and that the aquatic species are equally sensible with 
the terrestrial, therefore the movement can scarcely be caused 
by the temperature. But as analogous motions were observed 
by Mr Brown in spherical and other molecules obtained from 
vegetables, it is evident that such motions do not necessarily 
indicate an animal, but only a kind of attraction and repulsion 
produced by an uncertain cause. Another argument proves 
their vegetable nature, these plants give out oxygen, whereas 
if they were animals they would absorb oxygen and give out 
azote. 

Professor Agardh illustrates his opinion just stated by the 
following fanciful allusion. When thus fixed he considers 
these beings as no longer having any animal life, but as pre- 
serving the appearance of it, "Like those men of Plato," adds 
he, " agitated by eternal regret with which the remembrance 
of a happy life, the sweets of which they formerly tasted, 
inspires them; always oscillating, never tranquil, they seem 
aiming at the recovery of that happy life which they Lave 
lost." The locomotions, however, of the germes of these 
Hydrophytes, and their oscillatory movements when fixed, 
indicate at least a semblance of animality, and an approach to 
the confines of the animal kingdom. 

Leaving, therefore, these doubtful forms, as having no just 
claim to be considered as animals, I shall now proceed to those 
whose right to that title is generally acknowledged. And here 



80 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

two very different tribes start up and prefer their claim to be 
first considered; the Infusories, namely, and those which have 
been called Polypes and Zoophytes. But since the first of these 
two classes, by means of one of its tribes, as its great oracle, 
Ehrenberg, remarks, approaches the oscillating plants, — I shall 
consider it as the basis on which the Deity has built the ani- 
mal kingdom. Indeed, though the Polypes at first sight 
appear most to resemble the higher plants, in their general 
configuration, the Infusories, as well as coming nearer to the 
lowest by some of their members, in others exhibit no slight 
analogy to seeds. 

Of all the groups of animals those of the least consequence, 
one would think, must be those that for the most part escape 
the inquring eye unless aided by a microscope. The infuso- 
ries, or as they have been also called animalcules, microscopic 
animals, acrita or indiscernibles, amorpha or without form, are of 
this description. These wonderful little creatures, though 
they are every where dispersed, remain like seeds, without ap- 
parent life or motion, perhaps after animation has been sus- 
pended for years, till they come in contact with some fluid, 
when they are immediately reanimated, move about in various 
directions, absorb their proper nutriment, and exercise their 
reproductive powers according to the law of their several na- 
tures. Yet these little animals, though in some respects they 
exhibit no slight analogy to vegetables, are not only distin- 
guished from them by their irritability, but likewise by their 
organization, and powers of locomotion and voluntary action. 
Their mode of reproduction, however, is not far removed from 
that of some vegetables ; they are spontaneously divisible, some 
longitudinally and others transversely, and these cuttings, if 
they may be so called, as in the Hydra or common Polype, 
become separate animals. They are also propagated by 
germs, and some appear to be viviparous. The species of 
Vibrio found in diseased wheat by M. Bauer is oviparous, as is 
evident from his observations and admirable figures. Lamarck 
indeed regards them as having no volition, as taking their food 
by absorption like plants; as being without any mouth, or in- 
ternal organ ; in a word, as transparent gelatinous masses, 
whose motions are determined not by their will, but by the ac- 
tion of the medium in which they move. That they have nei- 
ther head, eyes, muscles, vessels, nerves, nor indeed any parti- 
cular detcrminablo organ, whether for respiration, generation, 
or even digestion. On account of these t^upposcd negative 
characters, tlicy wi're called by De Blainvillo, Ji<^astna, ov 
stomachless, ay havinir no intotilinct; : but Elncnbcii;-, who has 



INFUSORIES. 81 

Studied them in almost every climate, has discovered, by keep- 
ing them in coloured waters, that they are not the simple ani- 
mals that Lamarck and others supposed, and that almost all 
have a mouth and digestive organs, and iluit numbers of them 
have many stomachs. Spallanzani, and oihei- writers that 
preceded Lamarck, had observed that their inotions evidently 
indicated volition : this appeared from their avoiding each other 
and obstacles in their way; from their changing their direction 
and going faster or slower as occasion required ; from their pass- 
ing suddenly from a state of rest to motion without any external 
impulse; from their darting eagerly at particles of infused sub- 
stances ; from their incessantly revolving on themselves without 
a change of place ; from their course against the current ; and 
from their crowding to shallow places of the fluid in which 
they are : each species seems also to exhibit a peculiar kind of 
instinct. Lamarck thinks all this delusion proceeding from 
errors in judgment, and the result of prejudices inducing people 
readily to believe what accords with their persuasions. But 
to apply this remark to such observers as Spallanzani, «Slc., is 
drawing rather largely on the credulity of his readers, who 
might very justly change the tables and apply it to himself, 
who is certainly as much chained by system as any one can 
be. Admitting that the observations of Spallanzani just sla- 
ted record facts, it appears clearly to follow from them that 
these animals have volition, and therefore cannot properly be 
denominated apathetic, or insensible. The fact that they al- 
most all have a mouth and a digestive system ; many of them 
eyes, and some rudiments of a nervous one, implies a degree, 
more or less, of sensation in them all, and consequently that 
they have all, whether it be molecular and diffused in their 
substance, or confined to particular organs, I say that they 
have all a nervous influence and excitement sufficient for their 
several wants, correspotiding with their several natures. 

These minim animals may be said almost to be universally 
dispersed ; they inhabit the sea, the rivers, and other waters ; 
are supposed to float in the air ; they are found in the blood 
and urine ; in the tartar of the teeth ; in animal substances ; 
in vinegar ; in paste ; in vegetable substances ; in fruits, seeds, 
and grain ; in sand ; amongst tiles ; in wells ; on mountains, &c. 
Their numbers are infinite ; hundreds of thousands may be 
seen in a single drop of water; their minuteness is extreme, 
some being not more than g^Vo- P^**^ ^^ ^ ^'"^ ^" length, and 
yet these atoms of animals have a mouth and several stomachs. 

Let a man, says Dalyell, the translator of Spallanzani, 
conceive him:ielf in a moment conveyed. to a region where 

L 



82 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

the properties, and the figure and motions of every animal 
are unknown. The amazing varieties of these will first at- 
tract his attention. One is a long slender line ; another an 
eel or serpent; some are circular, eliptical, or triangular; one 
is a thin flat plate ; another like a number of reticulated 
seeds ; several have a long tail, almost invisible ; or their pos- 
terior part is terminated by two robust horns ; one is like a 
funnel ; another like a bell, or cannot be referred to any object 
familiar to our senses. Certain animalcules can change their 
figure at pleasure :^ sometimes they are extended to immode- 
rate length, then almost contracted to nothing ; sometimes 
they are curved like a leech, or coiled like a snake ; sometimes 
they are inflated, at others flaccid ; some are opaque while 
others are scarcely visible from their extreme transparence. 
No less singular is the variety of their motions ; — several swim 
with the velocity of an arrow, so that the eye can scarcely 
follow them; others appear to drag their body along with diffi- 
culty, and move like the leech ; and others seem to exist in 
perpetual rest; one will revolve on its centre, or the anterior 
part of its head; others move by undulations, leaps, oscilla- 
tions, or successive gyrations ; — in short, there is no kind of 
animal motion, or other mode of progression, that is not prac- 
tised by animalcules. 

Their organs are equally various. Some appear to take 
their food by absorption, having no mouth, to this tribe belong 
what have been called vinegar eels; others have a mouth and 
several stomachs, but no orifice for the transmission of their 
excrements; others, again, have both a mouth and anal pas- 
sage, and what is wonderful, in such minute creatures, some- 
times as many as forty or fifty stomachs f though many are 
without eyes, others are furnished with these useful organs, some 
having one, others two, others three, and others four; some 
have processes resembling legs. In the second Class of these 
animals, the Rotatories, to which the wheel-animalcules be- 
long, the internal organization approaches to that of the 
higher classes, for they exhibit the rudiments of a nervous 
system; their ahmentary canal is simple; they have a branch- 
ing dorsal vessel, but without a systole and diastole; their 
pharynx is usually furnished with mandibles, which are some- 
times armed with teeth. The mouth of the majority, espe- 
cially amongst the rotatories,, is fringed with ray-like bristles, 
which Cuvier thinks are connected with their respiration. 
This cirGumstance of a circle of rays surrounding the oral 

t PjuAi'K L Fic :?. 2 LcucopknjSf Enckdisy &c. 



INFUSORIES. 83 

orifice, is found in tlie polypes and several other animals of a 
liigher grade. Their use in the present instance, I speak 
more particularly of the wheel-animalcules, is by their rotation 
to produce a current in the water to the mouth of the animal, 
bringing with it the still more minute beings which constitute 
its food. 

These invisible inhabitants of the visible world created an 
early interest in inquisitive minds; Dr Henry Power, and after 
him the celebrated Hooke, about the middle of the seventeenth 
century, or earlier, noticed, what were called vinegar eels.* 
Sir E. King, in the Philosophical Transactions, described some 
experiments on the animalcules found in pepper water; and, 
subsequently, Mr Harris made observations upon a variety of 
these minute creatures. The subject was afterwards taken up 
by various writers, both here and on the continent. Amongst 
these none was more eminent than Spallanzani. O. F. Miil- 
ler, who seems to have been the first who treated the subject 
systematically, embodied these animals in a Class by the 
name of Infusories.^ He was followed by Bruguiere and 
Lamarck, who divided it into Orders and Sections. But the 
system of these zoologists has for the most part been set aside 
byEhrenberg, a Prussian naturalist, before-mentioned, who 
devoted ten years of his life to th« investigation of these ani- 
mals, for which he was particulady qualified by his previous 
studies and employment, the anatomy of the Molluscans of 
the Red Sea, by which he had been accustomed to the use of 
microscopes and micrometers. His researches on the Infusories, 
during Baron de Humboldt's last journey, extend to more than 
fifty degrees of longitude, and fourteen degrees of latitude; — 
he went as far as Dongola in Africa, and the Altai mountains 
in Asia, and examined these animals in a great variety of 
situations. He found them on Mount Sinai; swarms of vari- 
ous species in the wells of the Oasis of Jupiter Ammon; and 
at a considerable depth in some Siberian mines, in places en- 
tirely deprived of light. 

He considers them, it should seem, as forming a Sub-king- 
dom, which he denominates Plant-animals.^ This sub-kingdom 
he divides into two Classes. The first, from the number of 
stomachs,* with which the genera belonging to it are furnished, 
he names, Polygastrica, or many-stomached, probably, to con- 
trast with De Blainville's name before-mentioned. The second 
class he calls Rotatories,^ consisting of the ciliated Polypes of 

1 Vibrio Angvilla. 2 Infusoria. 3 Ph-^o-z&a- 

4 Plate I. Fig. 1 5 Rotatoria.. 



84 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Lamarck;* each of these clnsses lie subdivides into two parallel 
■orders, the first containing those that are naked, and the second 
those that are loricated,® or covered with some kind of shell. 

In the first of these classes, the Polygastrks, the animals 
recede further from the organization of the higher tribes, and 
approach nearer to that of vegetables; but in the second, as I 
before observed, rudiments of the organization of those tribes 
make their appearance. Many of the former are known to 
derive their nutriment from vegetable substances, but what the 
majority subsist upon is not certainly known ; but the latter 
class, the Rotatories, are ascertained to be predaceous, as above 
stated. Their mode of drawing their corpuscular food within 
the vortex of their mouth is thus amusingly illustrated by 
Spallanzani. As a certain species of whale, says he {sic 
magnis componere parva solebat), after having driven shoals of 
herrings into a bay or strait, by a blow of its tail produces a 
whirlpool of vast extent and great rapidity, which draws the 
herrings into its vortex ; the monster then presenting its open 
mouth, the herrings are precipitated into its throat, and it is 
soon satiated : so the carnivorous Infusories produce a vortex 
by their tentacles, and satisfy their appetite. 

I have been more diffuse upon the history of the animals 
whose functions in nature I am next to consider, because to 
them in a more particular manner, applies Pliny's observation 
with regard to insects. In his tamparvis, atque tarn nullis, qucB 
ratio, quanta vis, quam inextricabilis perfectio ! In nothing is 
the power and wisdom of their Almighty Author more signally 
conspicuous. Organization so complex, and life, and spon- 
taneous motion, and appetite, and means to satisfy it, and di- 
gestion, and nutrition, and powers of reproduction in animals 
of such infinite minuteness! Who can believe iti Yet so it is, 
and that each of these should be varied in the dififerent tribes 
and genera — that these less than the least of all the creatures 
that present themselves to the observation of mankind, and 
which till within a century or two were not suspected to exist, 
should out-number beyond all statement of numbers, all the 
other animals together that people the whole globe, that they 
should probably enter into us and circulate in our blood, nestle 
between our teeth, be busy every where, and perceived no 
where, till the invention of the microscope drew aside the veil 
between us and these entities, and we saw how God had filled 
all things with life, and had based the animal kingdom upon 
living atoms, as well as formed the earth and the world of 

J Platf. 1. FiK. '^. 2 See Appendix, note 'iO 



INFUSORIES. 85 

inert ones. Bui (o us the wondrous spectacle is seen and 
known, only in part; for those that still escape all our methods 
of assisting sight, and remain members of the invisible world, 
may probably far exceed those that we know. 

We may conclude that this vast, or rather infinite, host of 
animalcules was not created merely to be born and die; was 
not sown, as it were, over every part of the earth's surface, 
lurking in seeds, and other vegetable and animal substances, 
till coming into contact with fluid matter of whatever des- 
cription it starts into life, and swarming in the ocean, and its 
tributary streams; it was not thus dispersed everywhere, either 
alive, or in a state to revive and live, but for some great pur- 
pose, for which its organization, structure and station amongst 
animals, particularly adapt if. 

With respect to its immediate action upon the vegetable and 
animal kingdoms, it has been ascertained, as to many species, 
that they ascend with the sap in vegetables,* and are found in 
the blood and excretions of animals,^ who knows but they may 
act an important part in the animal frame; somewhat similar 
to what devolves upon thelarves of certain insects, with regard 
to stagnant waters, they may be depurators where they are 
thus employed, and contribute to preserve a healthy action. It 
is true, as far as vegetables are concerned, especially grain, 
they appear to destroy, where they take up their residence, but 
when we discover the same or similar species, in sour paste or 
vinegar, they seem destined to consume substances that cease 
to be wholesome; and in fact, in all fluids, in which they usu- 
ally so abound, they may be destined to fulfil a similar office, 
and it is a remarkable circumstance in their, history confirma- 
tory of this idea: that these animals, though animation in 
them is often suspended for a long time; when they swarm in 
infusions, having fulfilled their office, perish in a few days. 

It is probable that in the waters of our globe an infinity of 
animal and vegetable molecules are suspended, that are too 
minute to form the food of even the lowest and most minute 
animals of the visible creation, and therefore an infinite host of 
invisibles was necessary to remove them as nuisances. 

But the principal point, and that in which their utility most 
evidently appears, is their furnishing a principal portion of the 
food of innumerable animals of a higher order than themselves. 

1 Mr Bauer found Vibrio Tritiri, in the stalk as well as in the ear and 
grain of plants of wheat, which were raised from seeds inoculated with it. 
Phil. Trans. 1823. 3. 

2 See above, p. 81 . 



86 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Those infinite armies and forests of locomotive and fixed Po- 
lypes, that give to the ocean one of the features that distinguish 
earth, have their mouths surrounded with tentacles, when ex- 
panded assuming the appearance of so many blossoms, with 
these they collect their food, which, amongst the more minute 
ones, consists often of our Infusories. A single stem of these 
compound animals, having often innumerable oscula or mouths, 
requires avast supply of food; others equally compound, as 
the Ascidians or Alcyons, by alternately absorbing and expel- 
ling the sea water, draw in with it a supply of animal food, 
consisting, in part, of the creatures in question, which abound 
in the oceanic waters ; some of these have a common organ 
for this purpose, and in others each individual of the system is 
^tted with one; the MoUuscans and an infinity of the smaller 
inhabitants of the ocean, doubtless also derive a considerable 
|)ortion of their nutriment from them, the minute Crustaceans 
^probably do the same, and many insects, whose larvae inhabit 
>the waters, some by producing a vortex like the rotatories,* 
thus find an abundant suppl}^ to carry them to their interme- 
diate state. But not only do these creatures furnish the more 
minute animals that inhabit the waters, with a considerable 
portion of their food, but, it should seem, even some of those 
that are of a higher grade, and larger stature. Whoever has 
been in the habit of keeping gold and silver fish,^ in glass or 
other vessels, is aware that they require no other food than a 
fresh supply of water every second or third day. Their nutri- 
ment therefore must be derived from what they find in the 
water. In this may often be seen minute Branchiopods swim- 
ming here and there, sometimes with a bundle of eggs ap- 
pended to each side: but these are not suflficiently numerous 
to form the whole of their food, the water must therefore con- 
tain other nutritive substances which may contribute to their 
subsistence, and as it is known that various infusory animal- 
cules inhabit it, we may conclude that they are inserted in 
their bill of fare. It has been observed by an eminent writer, 
speaking of the gold fish, "The water, when care is taken to 
renew it frequently, appears suflScient for the nutriment of these 
fishes during many months ; but it should be considered that 
though this water appears to us very pure, it always contains 
a multitude of animalcules and very minute plants, which the 
fishes arc continually swallowing." 

When Creative Wisdom covered the earth with plants, and 
jieopled it with animals, he laid the foundations of the vege- 

I Cider, Strah/mnis, S:c 'J iifjirinusauratvs. 



INFUSORIES. 87 

table and animal kingdoms with such as were most easily con- 
vertible into nutriment for the tribes immediately above them. 
The first plants and the first animals are scarcely more thari) 
animated molecules,^ and appear analogues of each other; and* 
those above them in each kingdom represent jointed fibrils.^ It 
is singular and worthy of notice, that the Creator after the 
creation of inanimate matter, probably first imparted the living 
principle to bodies of the same form with the molecules and' 
fibrils into which that matter is resolvable, thus uniting, by 
common characters, things essentially distinct, and preserving 
unbroken that wonderful chain which links together all created 
things. 

Every body, who has eyes, is aware, that vegetation takes 
place upon almost every substance, upon the bark of trees, upon 
naked rocks, upon brick walls and tiled roofs, and even upon 
glass when not constantly cleaned. The first plants, that take 
on these their station, usually look like green or yellow pow- 
der, when they decay forming a little soil, in which others 
more conspicuous find sufl&cient nutriment, and so one succeeds 
another till a sufiicient portion of soil covers the rock, &c. to 
afford the means of life and growth to more perfect plants, and 
often to arborescent ones. An analogous process takes place in 
the water. The matihre verte of French authors makes its ap- 
pearance, and other Hydrophytes, in conjunction with the In- 
fusories, form as it were a first soil for the support and main- 
tenance of animal life, both for those which derive their nutri- 
ment from vegetables, and those that feed on beings of their 
own class. Thus a maintenance is provided for higher forms^ 
and, at last, for the highest; and a table is spread, both on the 
earth and in the waters, for every living thing, from that 
which the eye cannot discover, to man, the head and king of 
all. 

How wonderful and adorable is that Almighty Being, who* 
thus made all things dependant upon each other, and based! 
the visible world, in the three great departments into which 
we. see it divided, upon an invisible basis, and in which cohe- 
sion and life are maintained by those powers which God ha& 
placed as rulers in the physical world, and by which he still 
acts upon the universe of existences. 

1 For instance, Globulina and Monas. 

2 OsciUatoria and Vibrio. See Appendix, note 21. 



CHAPTER V. 



Functions and Instincts. Polypes. 

The tribe of animals to which we are next to direct our at- 
tention, though not invisible like the last, are almost equally 
concealed from our view by the medium that they inhabit ; so 
that, with the exception of those that abound in fresh water, 
and are easily kept alive for examination, the great body of 
them inhabiting the ocean, can seldom be studied in a living 
state. All the polypes are aggregate animals, in which they 
differ from the majority of the preceding class. The most im- 
perfect of them, as the sponges and some of the alcyons, seem 
to consist merely of a gelatinous mass, without any organs of 
prehension, which by its alternate contraction and dilatation, 
imbibes or sends out the water from which the animal derives 
its nutriment ; but the great majority have a mouth furnished 
with arms or tentacles varying in number. These are de- 
scribed as tubes, filled with fluid, expanding at the base into a 
small cavity, which when contracted necessarily propels the 
fluid into the tentacles, and thus extends them; but when the 
tube contracts, the fluid flows back into the cavity, and the 
points of the tentacles converge over the mouth. 

These parts are not only organs of sense, but also serve many 
other purposes, particularly those of prehension and motion ; 
and they very probably assist in respiration, which appears 
evidently connected with the alternate contraction and expan- 
sion of these animals. They are also so constructed as to lay 
hold of every substance that floats within their reach, whether 
by means of any gummy excretion like bird-lime, as some 
suppose, or whether they are furnished with very minute 
suckers by which they can adhere to any substance, has not 
been ascertained. Trembley observed, that when the common 
polype of fresh water touched any little animal with one of its 
long tentacular arms, it was immediately arrested, and in spite 
of the most violent efforts to liberate itself, which he compares 
to those of a fish that had been hooked, was held fasi, and 
carried to the mouth of the polype and swallowed. 

The body of polypes is formed of a kind of inspissated mucus, 



POLYPES. 89 

with confusecll}^ agglomerated, and probably nervous, molecules 
equally distributed ; it is covered by no skin, is extremely con- 
tractile, and forms an alimentary sac open at one end, serving 
both for mouth and anal passage. The equal distribution of 
nervous molecules through the whole substance of these ani- 
mals, will account for their extreme tenacity of life. In fact, 
this uniform gelatinous mass, which is without any organized 
structure, may be regarded as a kind of primary substance, 
which possesses characters, in some respects, common to both 
animal and vegetable matter. 

This substance without any nervous centre — though nervous 
influence, one would think must be in most force round the 
orifice where the tentacles are in action, — yet full of cerebral 
matter, sensible to the light without any organ of sight; ex- 
tremely irritable; alternately contracting and expanding, and 
thus movitig without any apparatus of nmscles; with no trace 
of organization but the tubular rays that surround its mouth, 
which appear to perform the office of eyes, hands, feet, and 
lungs; this singular substance lends a clue to form the class 
into Orders according to the circumstances in which it is placed. 

1. In the common Polypes^ of our ditches and stagnant wa- 
ters, it is a naked branching elementary sac or canal, without 
any internal support, and endued with powers of locomotion. 

2. In the Madrepores and others,^ its Maker for mighty pur- 
poses has enabled the animal to form for itself a fixed calcareous 
house or polypary as it is called, consisting often of iimumerable 
cells, each containing a separate individual with its mouth and 
tentacles, united to the general body at its other extremity, 
and each with an external aperture, by which they are pro- 
truded, and expand like a flower. 

3. In the Coral and affinities,^ it forms an internal calcare- 
ous axis, which it envelopes as the bark does the tree : it is 
fixed by its base like the preceding tribe ; and from this crust, 
or bark, the tentaculiferous mouths of the polypes emerge. In 
some the axis appears articulated. 

N.B. In these two last the base by which the compound 
animal is fixed to rocks, or other substances, expands like the 
base or root of a tree ; and by their ramifications these polypes, 
whether the polypary is external or internal, resemble its 
branching stem. 

4. The Sponges* and Alcyons^ have been generally arranged 
with the last Order, but, from M. Savigny's observations, it 

1 Hydra viridis^fusca, &c. 2 Lam ell? f era, Lam. 

3 Corticifera, Lam. 4 Spongiav 5 Alcyonium. 

M 



90 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

appears that certain of these animals have neither stomach, 
month, nor tentacles, the animal life of wliich he thinks might 
be disputed ; but Mr Bell has discovered that the}^ alternately 
imbibe and expel that fluid, which seems to prove their animal 
nature. Perhaps they ought to be considered as nearer to 
vegetable matter than the other polypes. 

5. Other Alcyons^ seem to have a more complex organiza- 
tion than any of the preceding polypes ; they are stated to 
have eight parrallel stomachs. Only four genera belonging 
to this Order have been described, and its proper station seems 
doubtful. 

6. In the Sea-Pen, and others,^ the animal envelopes an 
axis, as in the third Order, and has a tentacular mouth, but it 
is not fixed by its base. The greater part of these animals 
float in the waters, but others remain at the bottom, either 
upon the surface or partly plunged in the sand. 

Polypes are invariably aquatic animals, some inhabiting 
fresh water, but the great body are marine, and most numer- 
ous in tropical seas. In very high latitudes, only cellarians,* 
sertularians,* alcyons, and some sponges occur, and in the 
vicinity of volcanic islands in the Polar seas, corallines and 
gorgonians. These multiply a little from 6"^ to 9° N. L. : then, 
as they approach the tropics, the coral reddens, and the mad- 
repores whiten, and at 33° they attain their full powers of 
grow^th and multiplication. Some frequent the mouths of 
rivers, where there is a conflux of fresh and salt water. Some 
love atmospheric influence, while others avoid it. The marine 
ones frequently plant themselves on rocks, in different aspects, 
often regulated by the climate. They rarely expose them- 
selves to violent currents, or the direct shock of the waves. 
They are often found in the hollows of rocks or submarine 
grottoes, and in gulfs where the water is less agitated. 

It was observed above that the Infusories present some 
analogy to the seeds of vegetables ; the polypes go further, 
and represent, often most exactly, the developed plant from the 
tree, by almost all the intermediate stages, to the fungus,* at 
least tlie fixed polypes : these appear, as it were, to take root, 
to send forth branches which produce seeming blossoms, 
composed of what appear to be petals arising from a calyx; 
arranged sometimes in a single and at others in a double circle, 
and in some including the semblance of stamina ; they are also 
very sensible to the light, and turn to its source, and like plants 
% 

I rnlifpi luhijcri, Lam. 2 Pohjpi iiaianlis. Lain. 3 CcUana. 

4 Scrtulana. 5 Platk II. 



POLYPES. 91 

are readil}^ propagated by cuttings and buds ; so that all the 
older uaturalists regarded them as real plants, without appa- 
rently suspecting their animal nature. Ancient naturalists 
were very apt to mistake analogical resemblances for proofs of 
atRnity, but in the progress of science, when natural objects 
were submitted to a stricter examination, more correct ideas 
were substituted for these mistaken ones, and the zoophytes, 
or polypes, were generally admitted to be real animals, though 
some, after Linne, still regarded them as something between 
aninicil and vegetable. Trembley was one of the first who 
ascertained their animal nature ; he saw the fresh-water poly- 
pes,^ by means of their long tentacles, seize and swallow cer- 
tain grubs, and also many minute Enlomostracans, common in 
stagnant water. These polypes so used their tentacles as 
evidently to indicate a degree of volition, sometimes using one 
and sometimes man)^, as circumstances required. When they 
had secured their prey, they contracted and gave a curve to 
these organs, so as to bring it near the orifice, or mouth, at 
their anterior extremity, w4iich then began to open, and the 
animal they had caught was gradually absorbed. He has 
seen them attack small fishes, also worms, larvae, and pupae of 
gnats, parts of slugs, entrails, and even pieces of meat. 

The marine polypes are equally ravenous with the river 
ones, feeding upon whatever they can lay hold of, sometimes, 
like the wheel-animals, or rotatories, producing a vortex in the 
water, and thus causing a flow to their mouth of the infusory, 
and other animalcules contained in that element. It is to be 
observed that these inhabit a common house, from which they 
cannot separate themselves ; their sole character is that of 
being attached to an animated mass, so that each individual 
partakes of the life common to the whole, and also of a sepa- 
rate life, independent of that of the others. Yet the nutriment 
that one of these individuals takes, extends its influence to 
parts the most distant from the place it occupies. 

Having made these general remarks, I shall next give a 
history of some of the best known and most interesting species. 

1. The common polypes of stagnant waters, belonging to 
the first Order, have met with an admirable historian in M. 
Trembley, and what I have to communicate with respect to them 
will be chiefly derived from him. With regard to their repro- 
duction^ it is by germs and cuttings. The former issue gradu- 
ally from the body of the parent polype, as the trunk of a tree 
sends forth a branch. The bud that forms the commencement 

1 Monoculi. 



92 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

of a young one, is a continuation of her skin, and its stomach 
of her stomach. When she takes her food, the bodies of lier 
young are seen also to inflate themselves as if they had taken 
it with their own mouths, and the food may be seen passing 
from one to ihe other. After they have grown thus as branches 
for some time, and even have pushed forth germs themselves, 
they detach themselves from the parent stem, and become 
separate animals. 

It is stated that, by this mode of generation, in the space of 
a month a single polype may be the parent of a million of 
descendants. Trembley observed some long branches of trees 
that had fallen into the water, which he describes as being as 
full of polypes as a peruke of hairs ; and that though their in- 
numerable arms were at work, there was no confusion amongst 
them. 

But these animals, as is well known, do not multiply solely 
by germs, but also by cuttings, as they may be called ; their 
substance is so instinct with life, that nothing appears able to 
destroy it — a circumstance, perhaps, arising from the nervous 
molecules of which it seems almost to consist. If divided 
transversely, each segment will become a distinct animal, 
send forth tentacles round its upper aperture, and close the 
lower one; if it is divided longitudinally, each half will form 
a separate tube in an hour, and begin to ply its tentacles in a 
day; even if divided into longitudinal strips, instead of the 
sides turning in, as in the former case, each strip becomes 
inflated, and a tube is formed within it : and what is still moie 
wonderful, and seems next to a miracle, these animals may 
be turned inside out, hke the finger of a glove, without des- 
troying either their vitality, their power of producing germs, 
and of catching, swallowing, or digesting their food: so that 
they have, properly speaking, neither a within nor wilhoul, both 
surfaces of their alimentary canal being equally fitted for di- 
gestion. This, however, is not so entirely anomalous as it 
may at first sight appear; for cuttings of some vegetables, if 
planted inversely, will take root, the top bearing the root, and 
the bottom the branches and inflorescence. 

The fresh-water polype usually remains fixed by its closed 
extremity to one spot, from which it seldom moves, exhibiting 
no other trace of an animated being than (he motions of its 
arms ; but when the want of light or heat causes it lo shift its 
quarters, it moves slowly by fixing alternately, like a leech, its 
head and tail lo what it is moving upon. 

The majority of the marine polypes are attached, in some 
way, to a calcareous support formed by themselves, whicli is 



POLYPES. 93 

called by Amoureux, Lamarck, and olher continental writers, 
their Polypai^ ;^ and they are none of them locomotive except 
the last order. 

4. The Polypes of the second Order, the sheathed polypes 
of Lamarck,^ as the most important and inteiesling of this 
class of the animal kingdom, I wish to leave last upon the 
reader's memory. I shall, therefore, next make a few brief 
observations upon those sponges and alcyons that have no 
tentacles, and form the fourth Order. These are included by 
Lamarck amongst those just mentioned, but they appear not 
properly to belong to them, and to have a still more simple or- 
ganization. In this tribe, as was before observed, nutrition 
seems carried on by a kind of systole and diastole, the sea wa- 
ter being alternately absorbed and rejected by the tubes com- 
posing the substance of the sponge, they having no organs to 
collect their food in any other way. 

Many of these productions are remarkable for being hollowed 
internally, and in their external shape resembling cups, bowls, 
and vases : several gigantic specimens of this kind were col- 
lected in India by the late lamented Sir Stamford Raffles, to 
whose indefatigable exertions, judicious arrangements, and 
uncommon ardour in her cause, science is so deeply indebted, 
and presented by him, witli the rest of his valuable collections, 
to the Museum of the Zoological Society, where they are now 
to be seen. Their general structure also, as well as form, fits 
them for receiving a large quantity of water, as well as for 
parting with it, in proportion to the pressure, when received : 
in the living animal, this pressure is produced by its expansion. 

What particular function, or office, has been devolved by the 
All-wise Creator upon these zoophytes, which are produced so 
rapidly, and in such numbers, on the bed of the ocean and its 
rocks, has not been ascertained. As in the case of a vast va- 
riety of other marine animals, they probably derive their nutri- 
ment from the contents of the water absorbed by their tubes ; 
they may contribute their part to the depuration of the oceanic 
waters, and to the maintenance of the equilibrium amongst 
their inhabitants, however minute, which is necessary to the 
general welfare. Doubtless, in their creation, He, who inha- 
biteth Eternity, to whose view all time as well as all space is 
present, had in view the benefit of his creature man, to whom 
they form a very useful present, and which he has long ap- 
plied to his purposes. Sponges were in use as early as Aris- 
totle's time, when the people that employed themselves in col- 

1 Fr, Polypier. 2 Polypi vaginati. 



94 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

lecting them observed, that when they attempted to pluck 
them up they appeared to resist, whence they concluded they 
had some sensation.* They now form a very considerable 
article of commerce. The fishery for them is chiefly carried on 
in the Mediterranean, particularly in the Grecian Archipelago. 
The collection of them is attended with danger, as they are 
fixed to the rocks at the depth of several fathoms, so that the 
sponge-fishers must be excellent divers. Tournefort says, that 
no youth in these islands is allov/ed to marry, till he has given 
proofs of his capacity in this respect. Amongst plants, as Mr 
W. S. Mac Leay has, I think, remarked, sponges present some 
analogy to the puff-balls.^ 

5. A fifth Order of polypes, worthy of attention, is that to 
which the red coral belongs, in these the animal instead of be- 
ing covered, or in any way sheltered by its polypary, invests it 
completely, so as to form a kind of bark over every part of it; 
on this account the name has been changed by writers on 
these animals, and it is denominated their axis, since upon it 
they are, as it were, suspended, and run their prescribed race. 
This axis consists of a much more rigid, solid and lapidose sub- 
stance, than the polypary of the really sheathed polypes, pre- 
senting when polished the smooth substance and lustre of mar- 
ble, without any appearance of pores or other orifices — when 
broken it exhibits the same kind of fracture as a stick of red 
sealing-wax; this description refers particularly to the red 
coral,^ for in some other genera belonging to the Order the axis 
is jointed,* and in others, very flexible.^ The sheathed coral- 
lines appear in some sort, to be analogues of those animnls 
whose bodies are covered and defended by an external crust or 
shell, Hke the Testaceous MoUuscans, the Crustaceans and the 
Insects; while the tribe in question, especially those having a 
jointed axis, present some analogy to the vertebrated animals, 
in which the muscles cover the bones. It should seem, from 
the solid and compact substance generated by them, that these 
Polypes absorb from the sea-water a greater quantity of the 
matter which is converted into carbonite of lime than the rest 
of the class, so as to enable them to condense it into the small- 
est compass, and therefore Providence has gifted them with 
the faculty of making up m virtue, so to speak, what they may 
want in volume. A single-stemmed species, however, belong- 
ing to the flexible genus Jlntipalhcs, found by Professoi Esch- 

1 Aristol. Ilht. Jiv'nii. B. i. c 1, comp. li v. c. IC. 

2 Lijrnprrflov. '.\ Conilliinn. 

4 I sis, &c. .^) jinti/mtfirs. (iorn-oiiia 



POLYPES. 



dd 



scholtz, on the north-west coast of America, was ten feet long. 
The foot, or base by which the comnion coral is attached to 
the rocks, as indeed is the case with the whole section to which 
it belongs, is remarkably expanded ; it rises at first with a sin- 
gle stem of varying magnitude, which soon divides into a small 
number of branches, in their turn dividing and subdividing 
irregularly into a great number of others, so as to resemble a 
leafless shrub, rising to the height of about eighteen inches. 
After pearls, this is the most precious production of the ocean, 
and has always been a valuable article of commerce. As well 
as the common sponge, it is principally the produce of the 
Mediterranean, and is formed with such rapidity, that a place 
which has been quite exhausted by the coral fishermen, in the 
course of a very few years, is again replenished with it. It is 
probably enabled, by its broad well fixed base and rigid axis, 
to withstand the violent action of the strong currents of the 
sea just mentioned. 

6. The Floating Polypes, which form Lamarck's last order, 
chiefly differ from the coral in being locomotive, and sometimes 
swimming freely about in the sea, though some usually remain 
stationary, but never fixed. Their oviform germs, like those 
of many other marine polypes, are ejected by the mouth. The 
most noted species, from its singular resemblance to a quill 
with its plumes, is called the sea-pen.^ It is a phosphoric 
animal, and emits a light so brilliant that by it the fishermen 
can see the fishes swimming near it, so as to be able to cast 
their nets. 

The vast number of marine animals that are endued with 
the remarkable faculty of emitting light, indicate that it an- 
swers some important purpose in their economy. A fact ob- 
served by the celebrated Navigator Peron, renders it probable 
that its object is defence; he remarked that when the Atlantic 
Pyrosome^ was irritated, as well as when it was contracted, its 
phosphorescence was augmented. A variety of hypotheses 
with respect to the phosphorescence of the ocean have been 
started ; at first it was attributed to the revolutions of the earth, 
to electricity, &c.; then to putrescent marine animals, which 
certainly do emit light; but it is now generally known to be 
the property of a variety of the more frail inhabitants of the 
deep, and the above remark renders it extremely probable that 
it was given them by their Creator, to defend them from the 
attack of their enemies, whom a sudden augmentation of the 
intensity of their light may frighten fiom their purpose. 

1 Pennatvla argeiUea. 2 Pyrosoma allanticum. 



96 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

2. But the most celebrated polypes, and those which pro- 
duce the most wonderful effects in some parts of the globe that 
we inhabit, belong to the section in which the polypary is 
lamelliferous, or having the star-shaped oscula, or mouth, from 
which the polype exerts its tentacles, lamellatedor divided into 
various channels, separated from each other by elevated pro- 
cesses, resembling the gills of a mushroom : these, with seve- 
ral others related to them, Linne regarded as belonging to one 
genus which he denominated Madrepora, but which Lamarck 
has divided into eighteen! It is amongst the species of this 
genus, even as circumscribed by the author just mentioned, 
that we are to look for the polype, which is instructed by its 
Creator, not only to erect rocky reefs of vast extent and won- 
derful solidity — which often arrest and perplex the course of 
the navigator, and greatly increase the perils of navigation — 
and submarine mountains that keep gradually diminishing the 
mass of waters, but also islands, which emerging from the 
ocean, in process of time are covered with vegetation, and fitted 
to receive and maintain an animal population with man at their 
head. The species principally engaged in this great work is 
the coral, called by Linne the muricated Madrepore,'^ and gene- 
rally known by the name of white coral; but Lamarck seems 
not to have been satisfied as to this species, since it is excluded 
from his list of madrepores, though he refers to four, if not five, 
varieties of it as distinct species. Its polype, though so cele- 
brated for its wonderful works, seems to be unknown. Rum- 
phi us however has described that of the fungus Madrepore, 
and recently an Italian, Vincent Rosa, whose description I 
shall copy, another species. 

"From every cell," says he, "issues a cylindrical animal, 
resembling an intestine, transversely wrinkled, about half an 
inch long and two lines in diameter, and of which the upper 
extremity or mouth is surrounded by about twenty-two very 
short tentacles. These animals, which are pendent, because 
this madrepore is always fixed under the projections of the 
rocks, and vibrates at the will of the waves, are always of a 
lively orange colour, they contract as soon as they are touched, 
and they die upon being taken out of the water." Whoever 
examines a fragment of the polypary of any of the varieties of 
white coral, will find it to consist of innumerable radiating 
tubes, variously intercepted, all of which appear to issue from a 
common base; these are the receptacles of the general body of 
polype, while the connected individuals with their blossoms 

1 Madrepora vturicata. Plate 11. Fig. 1. 



POLYPES. 97 

inhabit an infinity of cells opening externally, from which the 
lentacles issue to collect their food. 

The seemingly insignificant creatures here described, and 
which seem as little animalized as any animal can be to retain 
a right to the name, all whose means of action are confined to 
their tentacles, and whose sole employment appears to be the 
collection and absorption of the beings that form their food, are 
employed by their Creator, to construct and rear mighty fab- 
rics in the bosom of the deep. He has so organized them, 
that from their food and the waters of the ocean, which by a 
constant expansion and contraction they absorb and expel, 
they are enabled to separate, or elaborate, calcareous particles 
with which they build up, and are continually enlarging, their 
structures ; forming them into innumerable cells, each inhabit- 
ed by an individual animal, which however is not insulated 
and separated from the parent body, but forms a part of a 
many headed and many mouthed monster, which, at every 
oral orifice, is collecting the means of still increasing its coral 
palace, and thus it goes on till it has formed a habitation, not 
for itself, but, as I said, for man, in the midst of the world of 
waters. 

One of their most celebrated historians, Amoureux, thus ex- 
presses himself upon this part of their history. " Some, by 
their union or aggregation, form a long narrow ridge or reef, 
which extends uninterruptedly several degrees, opposing an 
immovable rampart to the great currents of the sea, which it 
often traverse?, the solidity and magnitude of which increases 
daily. Sometimes this hne of madreporic rocks assumes a cir- 
cular form ; the polypes that inhabit it gradually elevate their 
rocky dwelling to the surface of the sea, working then in a 
sheltered basin, they little by little fill up its voids, taking the 
precaution, however, to leave in the upper part of this impene- 
trable wall openings by which the water can enter and retire, 
so as to renew itself, and furnish them with a constant supply 
of their aliment, and of the material with which they erect 
their habitation." 

They do not always elevate their polyparies from the depths 
of the waters to their surface, some extend themselves hori- 
zontally upon the bottom of the sea, following its curvatures, 
declivities, and anfractuosities, and cover the soil of old ocean 
with an enamelled carpet of various and brilhant colours, some- 
times of a single colour as dazzling as the purple of the an- 
cients. Many of these beings are like a tree which winter has 
stripped of its leaves, but which the spring adorns with new 
flowers, and they strike the beholder by the eclat of petal-like 

N 



98 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

animals, with whicli their branches are covered from the base 
to the extremity. 

Captain Beechey has given a most interesting account of 
the proceeding and progress of these animals in erecting these 
mighty works, and of the manner in which the sea forms 
ridges, when the animals have carried their work as high as 
they can : upon these at length a soil is formed beyond the 
reach of its waves ; a vegetation next commences, in time 
plants and trees spring up, animals arrive, and man himself 
finds it a convenient residence. His account is too long to 
copy, I must therefore refer the reader to it, but I must give 
here his statement of some proceedings of these animals, which 
have a bearing upon the principal design of the present work, 
and seem to indicate an instinctive sagacity in the polypes far 
above their rank in the animal kingdom, and quite inconsistent 
with their organization. 

Speaking of Ducies Island, a formation of the coral animals, 
he describes it as taking the shape of a truncated cone with 
the face downwards, the form best calculated to resist the ac- 
tion of the ocean, and then proceeds to say, " The north-east- 
ern and south-western extremities are furnished with points 
which project under water with less inclination than the sides 
of the island, and break the sea before it can reach the barrier 
to the little lagoon formed within it. It is singular that these 
buttresses are opposed to the only two quarters whence their 
structure has to apprehend danger, that on the north-east, from 
the constant action of the trade wind, and that on the other 
extremity, from the long rolling swell from the south-west so 
prevalent in these latitudes ; and it is worthy of observation, 
that this barrier, which has the most powerful enemy to op- 
pose, is carried out much further and witli less abrubtness than 
the other." We should feel some surprise if a bee, in the con- 
struction of its comb, should strengthen the points most ex- 
posed to injury ; but that an animal apparently gifted with 
the lowest degree of sensation, and no intellect, should know 
where to erect buttresses so as best to provide for the security 
of its structure indicates in a striking degree the superintend- 
ence of Providence directing its blind elibrls and unconscious 
operations. 

After considering all the wonderful facts here stated with 
regard to the proceeding and progress of these seemingly in- 
significant animals, a speculative imagination may not only 
picture to itself, with respect to any group of coral islands, its 
conversion into ono vast plain, yielding forests of broad-fruit 



POLYPES. 9^ 

and olber trees, and ultimately sustenance to a numerous po- 
pulation, and a variety of animals sul)servient to their use, but 
tciking a wider range and still further enlarging its view, might 
behold the tropical portion of the vast Pacific, not or>ly studded 
with these islands, but exhibiting thern in such frequent clus- 
ters and so large, as almost to form a kind of bridge of commu- 
nication betweeu Asia and America. Indeed, at present, we 
know not how far these founders of islands may have been 
concerned in rearing a considerable portion of those continents 
that form the old world. Calcareous strata and ridges occur 
every where, and though other causes may have contributed 
fo their formation,* yet it is not improbable, that at the time 
when our northern climates were inhabited by tropical ani- 
mals, our seas also might abound in madrepores, &c. which 
might bear their part in the erection of some of our islands. 

Professor Buckland, in the appendix to Captain Beechey's 
Voyage, states that even within the arctic circle there are 
spots that can be shown to have been once the site of exten- 
sive coral reefs. The old coral reefs that existed previously 
to the deluge, by that great catastrophe, in many cases, might 
be formed into chalk ridges. This indeed seems proved by 
the remains of marine animals, especially sea-urchins, which 
from this circumstance the common people know by the name 
of chalk-eggs, and which, we learn from Captain Beechey,, 
abound on the submerged ledges of some coral Islands; and 
at the same period, it is surely no improbable supposition, 
under the directing hand of Him who willed to destroy the 
earth by the waters of a flood, and at the same time deter- 
mir>ed, according to the good pleasure of his will, the precise 
mode of its renovation, that in the course of the rise, preva- 
lence, or subsidence of the mighty waters, which, for the prin- 
cipal part of a 3^ear, acted w^ith irresistible force upon the earth, 
consid-erable additions might be made from the debris of the 
earth's disrupted crust, to the reefs of coral that were left un- 
subverted, and so many islands be formed or enlarged. 

When the Creator formed the coral animals, what foresight^ 
as well as power and wisdom did he manifest I That a minute 
pouch of animated matter, with no other organs than a few 
tentacles surrounding its mouth, should be fitted to secrete 
calcareous particles from food collected by it, to transpire or 
regurgitate them so as to construct for itself a limestone house, 
that it should be empowered perpetually to send forth germs 
that could also act the same part; and thus in process of time.^ 

1 See Ly ell's Geol. 1. 130. 210 



100 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

by their combined eflforts, build up in the midst of the fluctuat- 
ing ocean, not merely insignificant islets, but whole groups of 
islands, which in due time, are rendered fit for the habitation 
of man himself, and do in fact become his permanent abode 
— but not only this, but should so order all other circumstances 
connected with this procedure, as, for instance, the action of 
the waves and winds upon this nascent little world, that when 
the animal has built up to that point, which its nature, for it 
cannot exist when removed from the influence of its native 
element, enables it to attain, should take up the wonderful 
work and complete the design of the Great Creator, and give 
the structure its due elevation and consohdation, should fur- 
nish it with fountains and streams of water; should cover it 
with a soil capable of afifording suflficient nutriment to irees 
and plants, which should in their turn aflford food for some part 
of the animal kingdom, and finally for man himself. How 
evidently does all this show the adaptation of means to an 
end. What a number of calculations must be made, what 
a number of circumstances taken into consideration, wljat a 
number of contingences provided against, what a number of 
conflicting elements made to harmonize and subserve to the 
promotion of a common purpose, which it is impossible could 
have been effected but by the intervention and constant guid- 
ance of an unseen Being, causing all things so to concur, as 
to bring about and establish what he designs ! And, when 
we further consider the multiplicity of aspects in which the 
subject must be viewed, in order to get a clear and correct 
idea of the co-operation of so many causes, seeming often at 
variance with each other; we may further aflftrm, without fear 
of contradiction, that the whole must be the plan and the work, 
as the primal y and only inteUigent cause, of a Being infinite in 
power, wisdom, and goodness. 

There are two circumstances in the above account of the 
proceedings of these animals, that more particularly demon- 
strate Divine interposition. One is the precaution to which 
they have recourse when they build a circular reef in the sea, 
that they leave an opening in this part for the entrance of the 
tide and its reflux, so that a constant renovation of the waters 
takes place, without which they could not proceed in their 
operation?, for want of their necessary aliment. 

The other is, not only that they erect their buildings in the 
form best calculated to resist the action of the ocean, but alpo 
erect break-waters to strengthen the weakest points, and those 
from which the greatest danger is to be apprehended. 

It is clear that beings so little organized, with scarcely any 



POLYPES. 101 

sense or feeling, are not sufficient of themselves to take these 
precautions, they must be directed and impelled by some power 
acting upon them ; which, foreseeing tlie want, provides for it; 
this can be no physical power, for that is equally without 
intelligence, and acts necessarily, but it must be the result of 
the will and original action of Supreme Intelligence, who either 
so organized the animal as to direct it to certain acts, when 
placed in certain circumstances, by the agency of physical 
powers ; or by his own immediate employment of these powers, 
influenced its action, as the occasion required. 

I cannot conclude this history of the Polypes without advert- 
ing to another circumstance which proves in a very striking 
manner the intervention of the Deity: and that they could not 
have assumed the various forms under which we behold them, 
from peculiar circumstances, to the influence of which, in the 
lapse of ages they were exposed. When we see animals, 
buried in the bosom of the ocean, symbolize the whole vegeta- 
ble world from the tree to the moss and lichens that vegetate 
on its trunk, and the agaric or other funguses that spring up 
beneath it, we are naturally led to inquire into the reason of 
this system of representation, exhibited by beings that have 
no affinity, nor are even contrasted with each other by juxta- 
position. 

One of the general objects of the vegetable kingdom was to 
ornament the dry land with what was /air to look upon, as well 
as with what was good for food. But the depths of ocean, 
though planted with various vegetables, seem unapt to exhibit 
in beauty the frail blossoms of the plant, which though they 
can bear the fluctuations of their own atmosphere, must often 
be destroyed by the greater weight and more irresistible agita- 
tions of a denser element. To ornament the bosom of the deep, 
therefore, more solid forms, sending forth blossoms capable of 
sustaining the action of such an element, were requisite: and 
therefore God, who gifted his creature man with an inquiring 
spirit, and with an appetite for knowledge of the works of 
creation, to furnish him with objects for inquiry, and to gratify 
that appetite to the utmost, not only placed before his eyes 
upon the earth an innumerable host of creatures, of which he 
could gain a notion by only opening his eyes and by observing 
their beauties, and experiencing their utility, might praise his 
Maker for them; but also filled the deep with inhabitants, and 
ornamented it with animals that appeared to vegetate and 
blossom like plants, that his curiosity being excited, he might 
also study the inhabitants of the water, and glorify his Maker 
for the creation of them also. 



102 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS'. 

But we may derive another use from the consideration of 
these plant-like animals, if the sceptic endeavours to persuade 
us, from the gradual progress, observable in natural objects 
from low to high, and from the narrow interval that often sep- 
arates those in the same series from each other, that by the 
action of certain physical causes, consequent upon certain es- 
tablished laws and a fixed order of things, and by the stimulus 
of certain appetencies in themselves, animals gradually changed 
their forms and organization, and thus, by slow degrees, kept 
improving in all respects, till at last the monkey became the 
man, if the sceptic thus attempts to pervert us, we may turn 
round upon him, and ask him, how it was that the zoophyte, 
buried in the depths of the ocean, should imitate the plant] 
can a studied imitation every where denoting purpose and de- 
sign, a mighty structure including innumerable forms and 
parts connected with each other and formed evidently accord- 
ing to a preconceived plan, be the result of the operation of 
blind, unguided physical agents, acting by the appetencies of 
these organized beings ] How indeed could they have any 
appetency to put on the appearance of a set of objects they 
never saw'? The thing is morally impossible. In ifact, when 
we survey the whole series of natural objects, and find through- 
out a system of representation, as well as a chain of affinities, 
it is as clear as the light of day, that an infinite Intelligence 
must first have planned, an Almighty hand then executed, and 
that infinite Love still sustains the whole. 



i 



CHAPTER VI. 

Functions and Instincts. Radiaries. 

It Imppens not seldom to the student of the works of creation, 
when he is endeavouring to thread the labyrinth of forms in 
any of the three kingdoms of nature, and has arrived at any 
given point, to feel doubtful which course to pursue. The 
road divides, perhaps, into two branches, which both promise to 
lead him right. At the very outset of the animal kingdom, as 
we have seen, there was some uncertainty, whether we should 
begin by the Infusories or Polypes, and now the Tunicaries, or 
Ascidians as some call them, at the first blush seem more close- 
ly connected with the Polypes, than the Radiaries, which La- 
marck has placed next to them ; but when we consider that 
the organization is much more advanced in the former than in 
the latter, not only in the organs of digestion, but in those of 
sensation, respiration, and circulation, we feel satisfied that the 
latter, where the object is to ascend, should first be considered. 
I shall, therefore, now give some account of the Radiaries. 

The animals forming this class receive this appellation, be- 
cause they exhibit a disposition to form rays, both in their in- 
ternal and external parts, a disposition which begins to show 
itself, as we have seen, both in the polypes and the infusories* 
with respect to their oral appendages, and is found also in the 
tunicaries and cephalopods, or cuttle-fish. And this tendency 
in the works of the Creator to produce or imitate radiation, 
does not begin in the animal kingdom ; the Geologist detects 
it in the mineral, and the Botanist in the vegetable, for Acti- 
nolites, Pyrites, and other substances exhibit it in the former, 
and a great variety of the blossoms of plants in the latter. We 
may ascend higher, and say that irradiation is the beginning 
of all life, from the seed in the earth and the punctum saliens in 
the egg, to the foetus in the womb ; and still higher in the 
physical world, sound radiates, light radiates, heat radiates. If 
we further survey the whole universe, what do we behold but 

I See above, p. 82, 89, «fec. 



104 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

radiating bodies dispersed in every direction. Suns of innu- 
nierable systenns, shedding iheir rays upon their attendant 
planets ; and the Great Spiritual Sun of the universe, even 
God himself, is described in Holy Scripture as that awful 
Being, " Whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlast- 
ing.^^ 

Cuvier, and after hina several other modern Zoologists, have 
considered Lamarck's Class of Radiaries as forming a group or 
class of the zoophytes; but when we recollect that they can- 
not, like the infusories and polypes, be propagated by cuttings 
and offsetts, this seems to indicate an animal substance in 
which the nervous molecules are less dispersed, and that some 
tendency to nervous centres has been established. In the up- 
per classes of invertebrated animals, indeed, many will repro- 
duce an organ when mutilated, and some even a head, but 
none but the polypes and infusories multiply themselves in 
the way above stated. It seems, therefore, most advisable to 
adhere to Lamarck's system, by considering the animals in 
question, as forming a group by themselves, and to adopt his 
name of Radiaries. 

These are distinguished from the class immediately preceding 
the polypes, by being limited as to their growth to a certain 
standard, as to their form by the general appearance of radia- 
tion they usually present, being either divided into lays, as in 
the star-fish; or having rays exhibited by their crust as in the 
sea-urchins ; or embedded in their substance, forming appen- 
dages to their viscera, as in the sea-nettle or jelly-fish. They 
have not, like the polypes, a terminal mouth or orifice surround- 
ed by food-collecting tentacles ; but one placed, most common- 
ly, underneath their body. Their digestive organs are distinct 
and more complex. They are never fixed, and are to be met 
with only in the sea and its estuaries. Lamarck has divided 
this class into two orders, the Gelatines^ and the Echinoderms." 

1. The Gelatines, which some consider as a distinct class 
under the name of Acalephes,^ are distinguished by a gelatinous 
body, and a soft and transparent skin; they have no retractile 
tubes issuing from the body ; no anal passage ; no hard parts 
in the mouth ; and they have no interior cavity, their viscera 
being imbedded in their gelatinous substance. 

Some genera* in this Order, like the fishes, are remarkable 
for an air-vessel which they can fill or empty, and so rise to 
the surface, or sink to tlie bottom at their pleasure, but. it dif- 

1 Radiaires molassrs. 2 R. Echinodermfjt. 

3 Actdepha. 4 Physsophora , 6lc. 



RADIARIES. 105 

fers from tliat of the fishes in being external ; others are dis- 
tinguished by a dorsal crest, which they erect and use as a 
sail.* 

2. The Echinoderms have an opaque, leathery, or crustace- 
ons skin, mostly covered with tubercles, or even movable spines, 
and generally pierced with holes, disposed in rows; retractile 
tubes which respire the water, and are used also for locomo- 
tion and prehension, emerge from these holes; a mouth gene- 
rally situated below, and armed with hard parts; and a cavity 
simple or divided. 

To begin with the Gelatines — in walking upon the sea-shore, 
I have occasionally remarked an animal of this tribe left by 
the waves, not much larger than a nutmeg, of a spherical form, 
with several longitudinal ridges, and nearly as transparent as 
the puiest crystal. If at all injured by the touch, it immedi- 
ately dissolved. Such delicate creatures has the Creator ex- 
posed lo the action of the oceanic waves, and they sail gaily 
on, by means of their ciliated tails, receiving no injury, frail as 
they nre, except in being sometimes cast upon the shore. 
These lucid gems of the waters,^ w^hich abound equally within 
the polar circle and near the equator, are eminently phospho- 
ric. Bosc says, he has seen raiUions, which he could scarcely 
distinguish during the day from the water in which they lived, 
but which in warm and calm nights afforded the most briUiant 
spectacle. From their rotatory motion, they seemed then globes 
of fire which rolled upon the surface of the water. The more 
rapid their motion, the more intense the light, and their tails 
always emitted more than their body. They doubtless absorb 
animalcules with the water that they inspire, and they swim 
by a motion combining rotation with contraction and dilatation. 
They are found from a Hne to six inches in diameter. Provi- 
dence has destined them to be the food of a vast number of 
fishes, even the whale does not disdain them ; and we ma)*^ 
conjecture the havoc that one of these giants of the ocean 
would make in their ranks. The manner in which they are 
propagated has not been ascertained, but from their infinite 
numbers in every sea, their progeny must be inconceivable. 

Another phosphoric animal of the present tribe is distin- 
guished by a dorsal crest, resembling a vesicle full of air, and 
which it is said to use as a sail, like many of the Molluscans, 
to conduct it over the surface of the waves. It is connected 

1 Vellelxi. 2 Beroe. 

O 



106 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

with the body only by its middle, its extremities being at liberiy, 
which enables the animal to steer its course in any direction. 

I shall mention one more of these gelatines, which falls under 
the observation of every one who is fond of sailing, or rowing, 
in a boat on the ocean or in its estuaries. If he cast his eye 
upon the water in fair weather, he will see numbers of animals, 
in shape resembling an expanded umbrella, with some flesh- 
coloured organs round the summit or centre, carried with the 
rising or falling tide, and dancing along with a seemingly un- 
dulating motion : these belong to what are vulgarly called 
the jelly-fish, or sea-nettles.^ Though the body of the animals 
of this tribe is gelatinous and easily melts, yet its weight is 
considerable, and it is said that they can render themselves 
heavy or light at pleasure, which some effect by means of a 
natatory vesicle, but, the means in all has not been ascertained ; 
unless they were thus gifted, as their specific gravity exceeds 
that of the water, they could not raise themselves to the surface, 
where they are seen swimming very gracefully ; as it were, 
by an alternate systole and diastole, admitting and rejecting 
the sea-water. Several of them,^ for it is not common to them 
all, when touched, cause a sensation similar to that produced 
by the sting of a nettle :^ it is supposed by some that this is done 
by their tentacles, which are conjectured to have little suckers, 
as indeed is very probable, which adhere to the skin. This 
faculty, which is supposed to be the lowest degree of the elec- 
tric power peculiar to several fishes, is found in other genera 
of this tribe; for instance, the Jamaica sea-nettle,'* is said to 
affect the hands, when touched, still more severely. Probably 
this faculty was given to them by Providence, either for the 
defence of their frail forms against their assailants, or to enable 
them to secure their pre)^, this being the general use of their 
numerous tentacles and other organs. Lamarck observes, that 
some of these animals are so large as to be more than a foot 
in diameter, and that some weigh as much as sixty pounds. 
Their multitudes are prodigious, and, as well as the beroe, they 
are said to form part of the food of the whale : they are even 
devoured by some of their own class. The mode by which 
these creatures are produced in such infinite profusion is at 
present unknown. They do not reproduce mutilated parts; 
therefore it cannot be, as in the polypes, by the division of tlieir 
bodies. 



1 Pi, ATE III. Fro. 1. 

y Rkizostoma. Cuv. Crphiw liliizostovw, Tj;iin. 

3 See Appondix, nolo !2'2. A Phiisnli.': firlainin 



RADIARIES. 107 

Wl>eii we consider the exlreme fragility and deliquescent 
nature of the animals constituting this order of the Radiaries, 
that a touch almost disorganizes their structure, and moreover 
that they form part of (he food of the most gigantic animals in 
creation, we should be led to think it impossible that they 
could withstand all these combined actions upon them, and 
that however numerous and prolific, they must at length be 
utterly annihilated. Nothing less, indeed, than Almighty 
Power, and Infinite Wisdom and prescience, and a Goodness 
that is interested in the welfare of the meanest as well as the 
mightiest of the animals he has brought into being, could have 
preserved them from such a fate. He who made all things 
decreed their mutual relations, limited their numbers by certain 
laws, and appointed the means by which those laws should be 
executed. We may say, that in some sense the whales were 
created for the gelatinous radiaries and numberless other ani- 
mals with which the seas frequented by these monsters abound, 
and that these gelatinous radiaries were created for the whales. 
The enormous mouth of the last-named animals is not armed 
with tusks or grinders, but fitted instead with vast numbers of 
oblique laminae of a softer substance, usually denominated 
whalebone, which is adapted only for the crushing and masti- 
cating of soft bodies ; therefore instead of a prey more propor- 
tioned to their bulk, they contentedly make their meal off these 
small but innumerable gelatines, which, by their number, 
make up for their want of magnitude, and are exactly suited 
to the masticating organs of their devourer ; and though the 
waste of animal life seems almost infinite, yet was it not for 
this check, so great appear to be the powers of multiphcation 
of the smaller creatures that swarm under the ice of the Arctic 
seas, there would be more than could be maintained consist- 
ently with the general welfare. 

The object of Providence throughout our globe, as has been 
before observed, is so to balance the respective numbers of the 
different kinds of animals, from the invisible monad to the 
gigantic whale, that a certain proportion may be preserved, 
with regard to their numbers, betw^een them, so that each may 
be in sufficient force to accomplish the end for which it was 
created. We may observe that though the whale devours 
myriads of millions, yet the quantum of suffering is less than 
if he were enabled to make his meal oflT larger animals, and 
his jaws, like the shark's, were fitted with laniary teeth. In 
fact the gelatines are incapable of suffeiing pain, having no 
digested nervous system, and when cast upon the shore they 
dissolve into a fluid exactly resembling sea water. 



108 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

The Echinoderms^ form the second order of the Radiaries. 
This name was first given by Bruguieres to a class formed 
solely of Linne's genera Echinus and Asterias, but Lamarck has 
added others to it. He has divided it into three sections, the 
Stelleridans, EchinidanSy and Fistulidans ; in all these the out- 
ward envelope is of a much harder substance than in the gela- 
tines, in the first and last of these sections resembUng leather, 
and in the other, consisting of the sea-urchins,^ it is a crust in 
some degree like that of crabs and lobsters. The animals of 
this Order, though their nervous system is obscure, have a high 
degree of muscular motion and are fitted with motive organs. 

To look at a star-fish one would wonder, at first, how it 
could move progressively, its rays seeming not at all calculated 
for that purpose, this however is wisely provided for. Those 
of one family send forth a number of tentacles, from a furrow 
in the underside of the rays into which their body is divided, 
each terminating in a cup-shaped sucker, which they can 
lengthen or shorten, and fix to hard bodies. These tentacles^ 
or legs, as Cuvier calls them, are similar in structure in all the 
Echiiioderms. They are separate]}^ retractile, their form is 
nearly that of a long ampuUaceous tube, filled with a subtle 
fluid ; the elongated tubular ptirt is that which appears without 
the shell ; the spherical portion remaining within the body : by 
means of the above fluid, as in the Polypes,^ the tube is darted 
forth, or retracted. Belon counted 5000 of these suckers in 
one species. In the sea-urchin star-fish* there are twenty 
rays, and the suckers are so thick as to touch each other. 
They may probably be of use to them also as organs of pre- 
hension to seize their prey. Those of the family to which the 
Medusa star-fish belongs, move in a different way. The 
diverging rays are firm and hard, have few spines, and no 
channel with suckers ; they are used by the animal as legs, 
and as they are regularly placed it can move in any direction 
that suits it. To go towards any particular spot, it uses the 
two rays that are nearest to it, and another that is most distant 
from it ; the two first curve at their extremity so as to form 
two hooks, which being applied to the sand drag the body 
forwards, while the posterior is curved vertically, and performs 
the part of a repelling leaver. The suckers, which in tliis 
genus issue from the sides of the rays, at the junction of the 
upper and lower surfaces, appear short, but being retractile, 
ihcy can be lengthened, and doubtless are used to seize the 

1 Ecliiuodcrmata. 2 Kckinus. 

3 Soo above, p. bS. t .hterias cchinitrs 



RADIARIES. 109 

animals that come in their way. What can more strikingly 
indicate the contrivance and design of an Intelligent Being 
tiian the structure of these stellated animals by which they 
are enabled to move in different directions, and to secure their 
prey 1 

The exterior envelope of the sea-urchins is formed by two 
membranes, the one external and thicker, and the other a very 
thin pellicle. Between the membranes is a thick, solid, calca- 
reous shell composed of a great number of polygonal pieces of a 
fibrous tissue, evidently immovable, but not soldered during the 
growth of the animal. The shell of the common species* if 
closely examined, when denuded of its spines and other organs, 
will be found to be divided into twenty longitudinal portions, 
ten of which are covered with breast-shaped protuberances,^ 
varying in size, which bear the spines, and ten narrow ones 
perforated with a number of small orifices, from which the ten- 
tacular suckers emerge, which last Linne named alleys;^ I shall 
therefore call the spine-bearing ones groves. These last are al- 
ternately wide and narrow, and of a lanceolate form ; the wide 
ones having six rows of the larger tubercles, and the narrow ones 
only two; between each of these groves is an alley containing 
nearly thirty oblique double rows of orifices, eight or ten in 
each row. These alleys terminate in a point at the upper 
aperture of the shell and are truncated at the lower. Each of 
the larger groves, if examined internally, will be found to con- 
sist of about twenty parallelograms arranged transversely and 
united by an harmonic suture, in which the edges are merely 
applied to each other without any inequalities. These larger 
groves have a central longitudinal ridge, at which it readily 
divides and discovers a beautifully dentated suture, resembling 
the dog's tooth of a gothic arch;* on the side next the alleys the 
dentitions of the suture are much less prominent and conspi- 
cuous. The smaller groves have the same ridge and divide 
in the same way, and seem to form one piece with the alleys 
on each side of it : so that one of the narrow groves with its 
two alleys forms the support of one of the frames of the jaws.* 
These narrow groves consist of about sixty transverse pieces, 
and when divided of double that number: thus wonderfully is 
the house in which these animals reside, formed by its Divine 
Builder. The sutures of the human skull, as anatomists ob- 
serve, admit of its more easy formation into a spherical box: 

1 Echinus edulis. L. 2 Plate III. Fig. 2, a. 

3 Ambulacra. Ibid. b. 4 Plate III. Fig. 3, a. 

5 Jbid.FiG.d.d. 



110 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

the shell of the sea-urchin is adapted with equal skill and wis- 
dom, the longitudinal sutures favouring the proper flexure one 
way, and the transverse ones allowing a curvature in a con- 
trary direction: and besides, by this structure, as Mr Gray has 
observed and De Blainville intimates, the gradual increment 
of the shell, by the deposition of fresh matter in all these parts, 
is rendered easy. 

But the spines and suckers of these animals are equally 
worthy of our notice and investigation ; the former as instru- 
ments of defence and locomotion, and the latter as instruments 
of locomotion, prehension, and respiration. I mentioned the 
protuberances, large and small, the latter usually planted round 
the former, shaped like a breast with a central elevation re- 
sembling the nipple, these afford a basis with which the spines 
articulate, being united to it by a membranous ligature or sac, 
so as to form a kind of ball-and-socket articulation, working 
upon these protuberances by means of the membrane, the 
spines can assume every inclination between vertical and hori- 
zontal, and may be used both as motive and defensive organs. 
The great zoological and physiological luminary of Greece, 
Aristotle, observed of these animals that they use their spines 
as legs for change of place,^ and Reaumur, who paid particular 
attention to their motions, found, that whether they moved in 
a horizontal position, as they usually do, or in a reversed one, 
or upon their sides, they principally used their spines. As 
they can move in any direction, some are used as legs for pro- 
gressive movement, others as points of support to prevent a re- 
trogressive one. It is by means of their spines, also, some 
performing one office and some another, that they bury them- 
selves in the moist sand on the sea shore. ^ 

It is not easy to conceive by what mechanism the spines are 
moved ; the protuberances on which they move are fixed, and 
there appears to be no communication between the interior of 
the shell and the membranous sac by which they are attached 
to them. " It is Very difficult," says Cuvier, "to see the fibres 
that move these spines at the will of the animal, for nothing is 
observable in their articulation but a very solid ligamentous 
substance, which it is very difficult to cut. I have examined, 
with a lens of considerable power, the shell both within and 
without, and have been able to discover no pores on either 
side, round the base of the protuberances or elsewhere ; so that 
it seems impossible for any muscular threads, however fine, to 
pass from the body of the animal to the comiecting ligament by 

1 Hist. Anim. B. iv. c. 5, ad lin. 2 Osier in I'htlus. Tr. l&2iy 



RADIARIES. Ill 

which it could move it and so give the spine its different in- 
chnations. Yet as tlie spines are employed by the sea-urchin 
to effect its motions, there must be some intei mediate agent, 
hitherto undiscovered, which it has at its command, by which 
iL can act upon them. Dr Carus's remaiks on the zoophytes 
in general are very applicable in liie present instance — " When 
we find," says he, " that there can be respiration without lungs; 
that nutrition, growth, and secretion may exist without a cir- 
culation of fluids ; and that generation may take place without 
distinct sexes, &c. why should we doubt that sensitive life may 
exist without nerves, or motion without muscular fibres'?" It 
is important to be observed here, that ihese spines, however 
strongly attached they may appear in the living animal, in the 
dead one fall off upon the shghtest touch, which proves that 
the cause of their adhesion is connected with its life. 

But though it is diflicult to detect the muscular fibres that 
move the spines of the common sea-urchin, I had an opportu- 
nity, when correcting the proof containing the preceding para- 
graph, through the kindness of my friend Mr Owen, of the 
Hunterian Museum, well known for his admirable anatomical 
description of the animal of the pearly Nautilus,^ of examining 
a preparation of the large spines, with their sacs, of the mam- 
miliary Sea-urchin,^ in which the muscular fibres were dis- 
tinctly visible, enveloping the base of the spine, when the sac 
was removed; so that, reasoning from analogy, it may be con- 
cluded that the spines of the common species have a similar 
muscular apparatus. 

The spines vary much in their form and sculpture. In the 
species last named they seem to be of a horny substance, vary- 
ing in magnitude and length, the larger ones tapering from 
the base and being blunt at the tip, they are beautifully fluted 
like the shaft of a Corinthian pillar.^ The part enveloped by 
the membrane before mentioned, is thicker than the rest of the 
shaft, perfectly smooth, but terminates in a bead : they are 
tinted with violet, but the base and tip, or the pedestal and ca- 
pital of the pillar are white. The base is concave so as to play 
upon the levigated centre of the above protuberance. Besides 
these larger spines, there are some bristled-shaped ones termi- 
nating in a subovate knob, which when unfolded appears to 
resemble a tripetalous flower with acuminated petals, and 



1 Nautilus Pompilivs. 

2 Cidaris mamillatus, Plate III. Fig. 4. 

3 Cidaris mamillatus, Plate III. Frc. 14. 



112 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

which are supposed to be polypes, ^ Those parts void of spines, 
called the alleys, distinguished by rows of orifices disposed in 
pairs, are furnished with a quite different kind of organ, I mean 
the suckers'^ before alluded to and described, by which the ani- 
mal can also move or fix itself to any substance ; it is thought 
also, as they are perforated, that it uses them to absorb the 
water for respiration. The length of these suckers or tentacles, 
for so they may be also called, when they are fully extended, 
is always greater than that of the spines, so that they may 
serve as so many anchors to fix the animal and enable it to re- 
sist the mass of waters that press upon it. They are stated to 
be more numerous near the mouth than in other parts, by 
which arrangement Divine Wisdom has fitted them to main- 
tain a horizontal position, which is their natural one. These 
suckers fix the animal so firmly to the rocks, that it is with 
the greatest difficulty, and seldom without crushing the shell, 
that they can be separated. 

> The most powerful and complex organs with which the 
Creator has gifted the Echinidans are their jaws and teeth. 
Their mouth has adapted to it a remarkable frame-work, con- 
sisting of five pieces, corresponding with five segments, into 
which the shell may be divded ; each of these pieces forms an 
arch,^ and the whole a pyramidal frame, which was compared 
by Aristotle to a lanthorn without a skin. To these are at- 
tached the movable part of the apparatus, consisting of five 
jaws, each containing a long tooth,* the teeth converging in 
the centre close the mouth. ^ Altogether this complex machine 
consists of twenty-five pieces moved by thirty-five muscles. 
The disposition of these pieces, Lamarck observes, and of their 
moving muscles, indicate that the parts of this machine can 
have only a common movement, and no one of them an indivi- 
dual or separate one; but it appears from Cuvier's elaborate 
description of this wonderful and complex machinery, if I un- 
derstand him right, that the action of certain muscles will give 
to any one of the teeth that form the pyramids an independent 
motion. This powerful apparatus, which the animal can in- 
cline in different directions, indicates a kind of food, less easy 
to bruise and masticate than what we have seen satisfies the 
whale, and these organs afford a singular contrast to those by 
which that enormous monster masticates its food. 

The Echinidans, whose station appears to be often near the 

1 PedkellaHcc, Ibid. Fig. 12, U. 2 Ibid. Fig. 14. 

3 Plate III. Fig. 3, d. 4 Ibid. Fig 10, 1 1 

T) Plate III. Fig. 9. 



RADIARIES. 113 

shore upon submerged ledges of rock, feed upon whatever ani- 
mal they can seize. We have seen that they sometimes turn 
upon their back and sides, as well as move horizontally, this 
enables them more readily to secure their food, with the aid of 
the numerous suckers in the vicinity of their mouth, which 
when once they are fixed, never let go their hold till the ani- 
mal is brought within the action of their powerful jaws. La- 
marck thinks they do not masticate but only lacerate their 
food; but as two faces of each of their pyramidal organs answer 
those of the two adjoining ones, and these faces are finely and 
transversely furrowed,^ this looks like masticating surfaces. 
Bosc, who appears to have seen them take their food, says it con- 
sists principally of young shell-fish, and small crustaecous ani- 
mals ; as the latter are very alert in their motions, it is difiicuU 
for the sea-urchins to lay hold of them: but when once one of 
these animals suffers itself to be touched by one or two of the 
tentacles of its enemy, it is soon seized by a great number of 
others, and immediat-ely carried towards the mouth, the appa- 
ratus of which developing itself, soon reduces it to a, pulp. 

Who can say that the All-wise Creator did not foresee all 
the situations into which this animal would be thrown, so as 
to provide it with every thing that its station and functions 
require ? Considering its internal organization and the nature 
of the animal itself, and that it holds a middle station between 
the polype and the Molluscans, in the former of which the 
development of muscle is very obscure, and in the latter very 
conspicuous, and that it cannot, like the former, fix itself by 
its base, and so support a polypary, or if endued with locomo- 
tive powers carry with it a heavy shell ; these things con- 
sidered, and the nature of its food, and the force necessary to 
prepare it for digestion, it was evidently requisite that it should 
be defended by a crust sufiicient to afford a support, and give 
effect to its powerful oral apparatus, and yet light enough to 
yield to the efforts of its motive powers ; but as this crust, from 
its composition and nature, was liable to be crushed by a very 
slight pressure, it required further means of defence, and with 
these its Almighty and Beneficient Creator has amply provided 
it, by covering it, like a hedge-hog, with innumerable spines, 
varying in length, and capable of various movements. The 
long ones, when erected, defend it on all sides, both from the 
attack of enemies and from the effects of accidental pressure, 
and we may conjecture that when the longer ones are couched 
to answer any particular purpose, the short ones may come into 

1 Plate HI. Fig. 11. 



114 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

play, and assist in keeping any pressure from the crust. Per- 
haps, as in the hedge-hog, the ordinary posture of the longer 
spines is couchant, and they are only erected when the animal 
is in motion or under alarm. 

The wonderful apparatus which closes the mouth of the 
common or typical sea-urchin/ is another and striking proof 
that Creative Wisdom employs diversified means to attain a 
common end, the nutrition of the animal. The mouth of this 
animal is under its body, a situation far from favourable, 
according to appearance, for the mastication or bruising of iis 
food : if its jaws moved vertically, like ours or the mandibles 
of a bird; or if they moved horizontally like those of insects, 
it would h9„ve been attended with no small trouble to an animal 
whose mouth was underneath, but its live pyramidal jaws with 
the points of the teeth in the centre, admit an action more 
accordant with the situation of the mouth. By means of 
its numerous muscles it can impart a variety of action to 
the mass and individual pieces that form its oral apparatus, 
so as to accommodate it to circumstances, a power not pos- 
sessed by the higher animals. In those Echinidans, whose 
mouth is in the margin of the anterior part of the shell,^ no 
such powerful apparatus is observable, its situation being in 
front of the animal, it is not as it were under restraint, it has 
less occasion for the aid either of tentacles in its vicinit}', or of 
a powerful apparatus of masticating organs. 

By furnishing these animals with a set of peculiar organs lo 
act the part of hands as well as feet, we have another instance 
of the care of Divine Providence to adapt every creature to the 
situation and circumstances in which it is placed. The legs 
and arms of the higher animals would be rather an incum- 
brance to an Echinidan, as well as a deformity ; it is therefore 
furnished with a set of organs better adapted to its peculiar 
station, wants, and functions, in a numerous set of retractile 
tubes^ capable of the necessary extension, fitted at their ex- 
tremity with a cup acting as a cupping-glass or sucker, and 
enabling the animal to adhere, with irresistible force, to any 
substance to which it applies them, and discharging at the 
same time the functions of hands to lay hold of their prey and 
convey it to their mouth, of legs and feet to stay themselves 
upon, and of lungs to assist in their respiration. 

The workmanship also in these animal structures is as beau- 
tiful and striking as the contrivance manifested in them is 

1 Fxhinvs rdulis. 2 jlnaiuhiUs, SpatanguSy i^'C 

3 Plate 111. Fiii. .% 



I 



UADIARIES, 115 

wonderful. Their prof libera ikc?, oRpecially in tlie mammillary 
sea-urchin, tlicir variously sculptured spine?, iheir tentacular 
suclvers, all by their perfect finish and admiral)le forms declare 
— The hand that made us is divine — since they exceed in all 
these respects the most elaborate human works. 

Tlie t/iird and last section of the Echinoderms, or spiny- 
skinned Radiaries, are the FistuUdans.^ Amongst these we 
may notice the Sea-anemonies,^ marine animals, fixing them- 
selves to the rocks, but having the power of locomotion, which 
from a common base send forth what appear to be a number of 
stalks terminating each in what seems a many-petaled flower 
of various hues, so that those w4io have an opportunity of 
observing them from a diving bell, may see the sub-merged 
rocks covered with beautiful blossoms of various colours, and 
vieing with the parterres of the gayest gardens. Ellis, who 
was the first Englishman who opened his eyes to the beauties 
and singularities that adorn the garden which God has planted 
in the bosom of the" ocean, has named many of these from 
flowers they seem to represent, as the daisy, the cereus, the 
pink, the aster, the sunflower, &c. 

These animals, at first, appear to come very near the polypes, 
especially the fresh-water ones,^ bearing a number of indivi- 
duals, springing, as it were, from the same root, each sending 
forth from its mouth a number of tentacles, which are stated to 
terminate in a sucker, and by which also, hke the other Echi- 
noderms, they respire and reject the water; they also reproduce 
their tentacles when cut off. Portions of the base when divided 
are reproductive, but they do not separate from the parent till 
their tentacles are completely formed. Their internal organi- 
zation, however, is much more advanced than that of the 
polypes. They have a separate alimentary sac or tube, sur- 
rounded by longitudinal muscles, and even nervous nodules or 
ganglions, and also several ovaries. 

In mild calm weather, when the sun shines, they may be 
seen in places, where the water is not very deep, expanding 
their many-coloured flowers at t,he surface of the waters — but 
upon the slightest indication of danger, the flowers suddenly 
disappear, the animal contracts itself and wears the aspect of 
a mass of flesh. They as it were, vomit up their young, or 
the germs formed in the ovaries: but they sometimes force 
their way out from other parts. When inchned to change 
their station they glide upon their base, or completely detaching 
themselves, commit themselves to the guidance of the waves. 

J Fishdidcs, Lam. 2 Miiniu. .3 Hydra. 



116 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Reaumur observed them use their tentacles like the Cephalo- 
pods, for locomotion. They fix themselves with so much force, 
that they cannot be detached virithout crushing them. 

It is not wonderful that so many of the lower aquatic ani- 
mals should have been mistaken for plants, when they so ex- 
actly represent their forms, their roots, their branches and 
twigs, their leaves and their flowers — but besides the irrita- 
bility of the animal substance, which however is partially ex- 
hibited by some plants ; there is another character which seems, 
as a strong hne of demarcation, to be drawn between them, 
and to which I have before adverted ;^ animals take their food 
by a mouth at one extremity of the body, plants by roots di- 
verging from the other. The reproductive organs in the latter 
occupy the place and ornature of the nutritive ones in the 
former. The gay and varied colours of the blossoms, the in- 
finite diversity of their forms, the delicious scent so many of 
them exhale, all are calculated to draw the attention and 
excite the admiration of the beholder, while the organs of 
nutrition are usually hid in the earth. Not so in the animal 
kingdom ; the nutritive organs, or rather those that prepare 
the nutriment, are placed in the most eminent and conspicuous 
part of the body, in the vicinity of all the noblest avenues of 
the senses, while those of reproduction are placed in the most 
ignoble station, and are usually found closely united with those 
passages by which the excretions of the body pass off. In the 
Tunicaries indeed the mouth and the anal passage*" are usually 
very near to each other, and in the polypes the same mouth 
that receives the food rejects the feces, and it even sometimes 
appears to happen that an animal has been swallowed, and 
after performing the ordinary revolution in the stomach, has 
been ejected again in a living state. 

] See above, p. 74. 2 Plate IV. Fig. 1. 



CHAPTER VII. 

Functions and Instincts^ Tunicaries. 

The animals we have hitherto been considering were all re- 
garded by Cuvier as belonging to his first class, the Zoophytes, 
and are continued therein by Cams ; the latter, however, 
allows that the Echinoderms are somewhat removed from the 
class by the commencement of a nervous system. Lamarck's 
next class, the Tunicaries,^ which we are now to enter upon, 
form part of the headless Molluscans*^ of Cuvier, and belong to 
that section of them that have no shells. My learned friend, 
Savigny, in his elaborate and admirable work on The Invertebrate 
Animals, who also considers them as a separate class, denomi- 
nates them Ascidians,^ dividing them into two Orders, Tethy- 
dans and Thalidans.* Many alcyons of Linne and others, are 
now referred to the Class we are treating of. 

The characters of the class may be thus stated : Animal, 
either gelatinous or leathery, covered by a double tunic, or en- 
velope. The external one, analogous to the shell of Mollus- 
cans, distinctly organized, provided with two apertures, the 
one oral, for respiration and nutrition, the other anal ; the in- 
terior envelope, analogous to their mantle, provided also with 
two apertures adhering to those of the outer one. Body ob- 
long, irregular, divided interiorly into many cavities, without 
a head ; gills occupying, entirely or in part, the surface of a 
cavity within the mantle ; mouth placed towards the bottom of 
the respiratory cavity between the gills ; alimentary tube, open 
at both ends ; a ganglion, sending nerves to the mouth and 
anus. 

These animals are either simple or aggregate ; fixed or float- 
ing : the simple ones are sometimes sessile,^ and sometimes sit 
upon a footstalk.^ The aggregate ones possess many charac- 
ters in common with the polypes, inhabiting, as H were, a com- 
mon body, somewhat analogous to the polypary, except that it 

1 Tunicata. 2 Mollusca ^cephala. 

3 Jiscidi(B. 4 Tethydes, Thalides. 

5 Cynthia 6 Clavelina. 



US FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

is more intimately connected with the animal that inhabits it : 
the wouth of all is surrounded with ra)^s or tentacles, as is also, 
in many, the anal orifice; but in their organization they differ 
very widely, exhibiting traces of a nervous system, and even, 
in some, of one of circulation. The fixed ones are commonly 
attached to rocks or other inorganized substances, but some- 
times they are parasitic ; thus a species of botrylle* envelopes, 
like a cloak, certain ascidians, and another of the Tunicaries" 
envelopes the madrepores, more or less, with a milk white 
crust. 

The Creator, when he filled the waters of the great deep 
with that infinite variety of animals of which every day brings 
genera and species, before unknown, to light, willed that many 
of them should, as it were, form a body politic, consisting of 
many individuals, separate and distinct as inhabiting different 
cells, but still possessing a body in common, and many of them 
receiving benefit from the systole and diastole of a common 
organ : thus, by a material union, is symbohzed, what in ter- 
restrial animal communities results from numerous wills unit- 
ing to effect a common object. The land, as far as I can re- 
collect, exhibits no instance of an aggregate animal; nor the 
ocean of one, which, like the beaver, lemming, bee, wasp, ant, 
white ant, and many others, forms associations to build and 
inhabit a common house, and rear a common family. — Pro- 
bably the nature of the different mediums these several ani- 
mals inhabit is the cause of this diversity ; and Providence, 
when it willed the peophng of the waters, as well as of the 
earth and air, into which the effluxes of light and heat from 
the central orb could not so penetrate and be diffused as to act 
with the same power and energy as upon the earth's surfixce, 
and in its atmosphere, so formed them as to suit the circum- 
stances in which they were to be placed. Instead of sending 
the social aquatic animals forth by myriads to collect food and 
materials for their several buildings, he took the vegetable cre- 
ation for the type of their general structure, in many cases 
fixed them to the rock or stone, united them all into one body, 
which, under a common envelope, contained often inmunera- 
ble cells from which were sent forth by the occujiant of each 
a circle of organs to collect food, from which, by some chemi- 
cal operation, they could elaborate mat,erials for the enlarge- 
ment of tJicir conunon house; and often cause that intlux and 
refiux, to compare small things with great, resembling the 
oceanic tides, and by which the sea- water is alternately ab- 

I fU>li ijllus pohjctirlu.'i. '1 Didrnnium cinuUihnn. Sav 



TUNICARIES. 119 

soibed and rejected by these animals : but this function, in the 
case of some of the Tunicaries, the animals with which we are 
now concerned, seems to be affected by a central organ or 
pump common to the whole fraternity. 

But although none of the marine associated animals are 
employed, like the terrestrial ones, in labours that require loco- 
motion and the collection, from dilierent and often distant 
parts, of materials for the erection of their several fabrics, and 
of food to store up for the maintenance of the various members 
of their community, yet there are some that are instructed to 
form associations, which yet are not united by any material 
tie or common body, so as to be physically inseparable. Of 
this description are the Salpes,^ or biphores, as the French call 
them. These are phosphoric animals, so transparent that all 
their internal organs and all their movements, and even all 
the contents of their intestines, may be distinctly seen. They 
are gelatinous like the medusas and heroes, and hke them dis- 
solve into water. Their organization, however, proves them 
to be Tunicaries, Certain species of these animals, in this re- 
pect unlike every other genus of the animal kingdom, have 
the property of uniting themselves together, not fortuitously and 
irregularly, but from their birth and in a certain undeviating 
order. Bosc observed the reunion of the confederate Salpe,^ 
which he thus describes : " Every individual is attached by its 
sides to two others, the mouth of which is turned to the same 
side ; and by the back also to two others, when it is turned to 
the opposite side." In this circumstance it presents an ana- 
logy to the combs of the hive bee, in which each comb consists of 
a double set of cells placed base to base, with the mouths of each 
set looking opposite ways, and the cells so placed that a third 
of the base of three cells occupies the whole of one base in the 
opposite set.^ This reunion, in the salpes, is effected by means 
of eight pedicles, of a nature exactly similar to that of the 
body. It is perfectly regular, that is to say — all the indivi- 
duals are at the same distance and height, all the heads in one 
row are turned to the same side, and those of another to the 
opposite. These rows usually consist of from forty to fifty in- 
dividuals, and are carried by the waves sometimes in a straight, 
sometimes in a curved, and sometimes in a spiral hne. In the 
sea, during the day, they appear like white ribands, and dur- 
ing the night like ribands of fne, which alternately roll up 
and unroll, wholly or partially, either from the motion of the 

I Sal pa. 2 Salpa confaderata . 

'. Plate XI. Fio. 3. 



120 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

water, or from the will of the animals that compose them. 
They are found in the ocean only at a great distance from 
land. Professor Eschscholz mentions one,^ intermediate be- 
tween the Salpes and Pyrosomes — and a similar one is now 
in the Hunterian Museum^ — which by means of a pedicle 
appeared to be attached to some common body, all of them 
arranged in rows with the head turned to the same side ; 
Savigny, whose eye nothing escaped, and the acumen of 
whose intellect equalled that of his sight, alas now dark, fur- 
ther informs us, that the Salpes adhere to each other only by 
certain gelatinous protuberances, or as Lamarck suspects, cer- 
tain lateral suckers, disposed so as not to impede the motions 
of the muscles ; but their union is only temporary. At a cer- 
tain age, M. Peron observes, these animals separate, all the 
large individuals being solitary. The same traveller is of opin- 
ion that the concatenation of the Salpes is coeval with their 
birth. 

The object of Divine Providence in endowing these animals 
with an instinct so singular can only be conjectured. They 
are of so very frail a nature, that perhaps when first produced, 
the fluctuations of the mass of waters, to the surface of which 
they appear to rise, might be sufficient to destroy them, or to 
carry them to the shore, where they would inevitably perish ; 
but by being united in bands, they may be better able to resist 
their force, and perhaps the more vivid light they thus produce, 
may be designed for defence,^ or to answer some other import- 
ant purpose. When they have attained maturity of size and 
strength they may be better able to direct their course and 
avoid these injuries. The young of terrestrial animals gene- 
rally are associated, under the guidance and protection indeed 
of the mother, till they are of age to take care of themselves. 
The object of Providence in both cases is the same, though 
the modes of its accomplishment vary accordino- to the situa- 
tion and circumstances of individuals. When we see such 
paternal care manifested for the welfare and maintenance in 
in existence, of beings so frail, that a mere touch would dis- 
sipate them, we cannot but assent to the observation of the 
Psalmist, that " His tender mercies are over all his iror/c5," the 
least and most insignificant as well as those that appear to 
occupy the most elevated place in the animal kingdom : and 
we may feel a comfortable assurance, built on this ground, that 
the eye which regards even these seemingly insignificant crea- 

1 Anchinia 2 Plate IV. Fig. 2. 3 See above, p. 95 



TUNICARIES. ' 121 

tures, will, if we cast not off our confidence, never overlook us, 
or be indifferent to our welfare. 

The last and highest tribe, belonging to the present class, 
are those which are never united to each other, but aresohtary 
in all stages of their existence. These, as well as the preceding 
ones, make a near approach to the real MoUuscans, at least 
their external and internal envelope bears considerable analogy 
with that of bivalve shells, as Lamarck acknowledges, though 
they differ in having a distinct organization, the shells of bi- 
valves having neither apparent vessels nor fluids, while, in 
these Tunicaries^ the covering, both external and internal, in 
some species, exhibits vascular ramifications very conspicu- 
ously. 

Though several of the animals belonging to the class of 
Tunicaries are interesting on account of their singularity and 
beauty, I shall only select two, one from the aggregated, and 
one from those that are simple, for description and further 
remarks, and then proceed to the great class of MoUuscans. 
Who would think, asks Lamarck, that the Pyrosome, first ob- 
served by Peron and Le Sueur, was an assemblage of little 
aggregate animals; any one that looked at this animal, or at 
Savigny's figure of it,^ would mistake it for a simple polype, 
with a number of leaf-like appendages growing from its skin: 
but a closer examination would give him a very different idea, 
and he would discover, with w^onder, that it was a mass filled 
with animals, united by their base, exceeding the number of 
the above appendages. The common body that contains these 
creatures resembles a hollow cylinder closed at its upper ex- 
tremity and open at the lower; this body or mass is gelatinous 
and transparent, a number of tubercles of a firmer substance 
than the tube, but at the same time transparent, polished, and 
shining, differing in size, cover the surface ; some being very 
short, and others longer, and the longer ones terminated by a 
lance-shaped leaflet. At the summit of each tubercle is a cir- 
cular aperture, without tentacles, opposite to which is another 
circular orifice which is toothed. 

The pyrosomes are the largest of the phosphoric animals, 
the Atlantic species'^ being about five inches long, and the 
Mediterranean^ sometimes attaining to the length of fourteen. 
Their power of emitting light is so great that in the night they 
cause the sea to appear on fire. Nothing can exceed the daz- 

1 Ardm.sans. Verthhr. Pi. IV. Fig. 7. 2 P. atlanticum. 

3 P. giganteum. Pl IV. Fig. 3 
Q 



122 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

zling light and brilliant colours that these floating bodies exhi- 
bit — colours varying in a way truly admirable, passing rapidly 
every instant, from a dazzling red to saffron, to orange, to 
green, and azure, and thus reflecting every ray into which the 
prism divides the light, or which is exhibited by tiie heavenly 
bow. In the water their position is generally horizontal, and 
their locomotion very simple : they float, as they are carried by 
the waves or the currents ; like the salpes, they can however 
contract and restore themselves individually, and have also a 
very slight general movement which causes the water to enter 
their common cavity, visit their gills for respiration, and convey 
to them the substances which constitute their food. M. Le 
Sueur observed that when the central cavity of the common 
tube was filled with water, it wsls immediately spirted forth in 
little jets from all the extremities of the tubercles with which 
the surface was covered, from whence it appears that the ex- 
ternal aperture of the individual animal is really the anal 
aperture, and the opposite or internal one the mouth, which 
thus received the water and the food it conveyed from the 
common tube, and rejected it by the orifice of the tubercles. 

The internal organization of the little tenants of the common 
tube is given with considerable detail by Savigny,^ the general 
opening at the summit, or truncated end of the tube, has an 
annular diaphragm, from whicJi it appears that they are ar- 
ranged in circles round it, so that in this respect they form 
rays ; in shape they somewhat resemble a florence-flask, and 
have alternately a long and short neck. The cavity below the 
neck is filled by the gills and various intestines, which it would 
be difficult to describe intelligibly, in a popular manner. There 
seems some analogy in these floating hives of luminous ani- 
mals, both as to size and motion, with the sea-pens.^ 

No species of the genus appears to have been met with in 
our seas, we may therefore conjecture that a warmer climate 
is essential to them. Their general functions beyond tluit 
of illuminating the great theatre in w^hich their Creator has 
placed them, and probably affording food to some of the inhab- 
itants of the seas in which they are found, have not yet been 
ascertained. Neither of the orifices of these little animals is 
furnished with tentacles, but their branchial orifice is toothed, 
in this they appear to differ from the great majority of aggre- 
gate animals. We may conjecture tliat when the water passes 
into the tube the diaphragm, is either dropped or elevated to 
admit it, and then resuming a horizontal position closes the 

I Ubi. ^upr. pi. xx'n. -vxiii 2 Sec above, p. 95. 



TUNICARIES. 123 

orifice so that the water is forced into the interior aperture of 
the individual animals and passes out, as above described, by 
the exterior one. Food-collecting- tentacles, therefore, would 
ill this case be unnecessary, as their food would enter their 
moutlis with the water. Providence thus taking care to com- 
pensate by this contrivance for the want of the ordinary in- 
struments. 

Some of the Tunicaries are stated to have recourse to a sin- 
gular mode of defence. When seized by the hand, contract- 
ing themselves forcibly, they ejaculate the water contained in 
their cavities, so as often suddenly to inundate the face of the 
fisherman, who in the astonishment of the moment suffers the 
animal to escape. If this be a correct statement it proves that 
these animals are not altogether without some degree of intel- 
ligence, they know when they are assailed and how to repel 
the assailant. 

Having given some account of the most interesting of the 
aggregate Tunicaries, I am next to notice the simple ones. — 
In these the two orifices by which the sea-water is received 
and expelled are not at opposite extremities, but usually ap- 
proximated, one being higher than the other and furnished 
with tentacular filaments. The animals are fixed to rocks, 
shells, and sometimes to sea-weeds, and are either sessile, or 
elevated on a footstalk : the sessile ones present a considerable 
analogy with the puff-balls, and the others with different fun- 
guses, as Clavaria, &c. They seem, especially Boltenia^ which 
is covered with short stiff bristles, to approach the Echinidans. 
Nothing more is known of these animals, than that,' like the 
others, they alternately absorb and expel the sea-water. The 
Cynthia Momus^ is remarkable for its changes of colour, being 
sometimes white, sometimes orange, and sometimes of a flesh- 
colour. As all this tribe are fixed, their history furnishes no 
other interesting traits. 

Nothing is more striking than the infinitely diversified forms 
into which Creative Power has moulded the little frail animals, 
in this as well as the preceding classes, that are destined to 
inhabit, and numbers of them to illuminate, the wide expanse 
of waters occupying so large a portion of the globe we inhabit. 
When we survey, with curious and delighted eyes, the varied 
tribes that cover the soils of every aspect and elevation of that 
part of it that emerges from the fluctuating surface of the great 
deep, and which, instead of deriving their nutriment and means 

1 Plate IV. Fig. 1. 



124 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

of life and breath from the waters, saline or fresh, live, and 
breathe, and are fed, by principles and elements communicated, 
either mediately or immediately, from the atmospheric ocean, 
an expanse that envelopes uninterruptedly the whole of our 
globe, and which itself is fed and renovated by the constant 
effluxes of the great centre of irradiation ; which also in its 
turn, as well as all the other orbs that burn and are radiant, 
and those that revolve around them and reflect their light, re- 
ceive their all from Him, that great and ineffable being, 
who gives to all and receives from none. But I lose myself, 
in infinite amazement ; I shrink into very nothingness, when I 
reflect that such a miserable worm as I am, so fallen and cor- 
rupted, should presume to lift its thought so high, and lose 
itself in the depths of the unfathomable ocean of Deity. He 
has, however, commanded us to seek him, and assured us we 
shall find him if we seek him humbly and sincerely — he liath 
set before us his works and his word, in both of which he has 
revealed himself to us : and if our great object be to glorify him 
rather than ourselves, we shall collect the truth from each, 
and shall find that they deliver, though each in a different 
language and style, the same mysteries ; for they are the work 
and the word of the same Almighty Author, and must, there- 
fore, if rightly interpreted, deliver the same truths, since they 
can no more contradict each other than he can contradict 
himself. 

But let me endeavour to emerge from this ocean in which 
I seem to have lost myself, and, recovering my station upon 
terra jirma, direct the attention of the reader to the lovely tribes 
that adorn every part and portion of this our destined but brief 
abode, I mean to the vegetable kingdom ; we see how they 
cover earth, that not a spot can be found, of which in time 
they do not possess themselves, and that the more we extend 
our inquires the more numerous are the individual species with 
which we become acquainted. This being the case upon 
earth, reasoning from analogy, we may conclude that some- 
thing similar takes place in the ocean ; that could our discove- 
ries be extended under the sea as easily as they are upon land ; 
could we traverse the bed and waters of the great deep with 
the same facility that we do the surface of the earth, we should 
find the numbers of vegetables that respire, in some sense, the 
air, fall short perhaps of those plant-like animals that respire the 
water. And could we examine the individual species of which 
this infinite host consists, and compare their organizations, we 
should find as great adiflerence in the uistruments and organs 



TUNICARIES. 125 

by which their life is supported and their kind continued, as 
in the animals themselves ; and yet in all this diversity should 
trace a harmony and concatenation that would evidently prove 
the Wisdom that contrived, the Power that formed, and the 
Groodness that gave a living principle and breath of life to all 
these creatures, were each of them the attributes of an infi- 
nite BEING. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

Functions and Instincts. Bivalve Molluscans. 

Hitherto in our progress from the lowest animals upwards, 
the mind has been perpetually submerged ; not only every 
group, but every individual that we have had occasion to con- 
sider, has been an inhabitant of the waters, and to the great 
body of which a fluid medium is as necessary to life and action 
as an aerial one is to a land animal, but now we shall be per- 
mitted to emerge occasionally, for although the largest pro- 
portion of the animals forming the great class we are now to 
advert to, the Molluscans, are also aquatic, yet still a very 
considerable number of them are terrestrial, as a stroll abroad 
will soon convince us, when after a shower we find we can 
scarcely set a step without crushing a snail or a slug. 

The term Molluscan^ was employed by Linne to designate 
his second class of worms,^ which excluded all the shell-fish, 
and amongst real Molluscans included both Radiaries, Tuni- 
caries, and Worms; it literally signifies a nut or walnut, and 
therefore seems more properly applied to shell-fish, than to 
animals which are defined as simple and naked. As now un- 
derstood, it still comprehends a very wide range of animal 
forms, and it seems difficult to describe them by any character 
common to them all. Their Almighty Author, in the progress 
of his work of creation, linked form to form in various ways ; 
he not only made an animal of a lower grade a stepping-stone 
towards one of a higher, and which formed a part of the ascent 
to man, the highest of all; but as the mighty work proceeded, 
he threw out on each side collateral forms that ascend by a dif- 
ferent route, or begin one to a different order of beings. And 
this circumstance it is that has opened the door for so many 
systems and that diversity of sentiment with respect to the 
grouping of animals, which we meet with in the writings of 
the most eminent naturalists. Some proceed by one path 
and some by another, though the object of all is the same, 

1 MolltLSca. 2 Vermes 



BIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 127 

unless some bias from a favourite hypothesis interferes and 
diverts them from a right judgment. 

The organization of the animals of the Class we have just 
left, as we have seen, appears of a higher character than that 
of any of the preceding ones; traces of a heart appear ; a nerv- 
ous ganglion is detected between the mouth and anus, send- 
ing nerves to each ; a regular respiratory system by means of 
gills becomes evident ; but still the animal is furnished with 
no head, no eyes, and in numerous cases has no separate 
existence, but forms a branch of the general body — thus re- 
sembling a plant — from which it cannot dissociate itself and 
become an independent individual. 

Indeed when we enter the Class of Molluscans, we find that 
the nearest affinities of the Tunicaries have hkewise no head, 
and this circumstance appears to have induced Lamarck not 
only to separate them from the class as arranged by Cuvier, 
but also his whole family of headless Molluscans,^ of which he 
forms his two Classes of Cirripedes^ and Conchifers.^ The ab- 
sence of a head from the animals of the bivalve and multivalve 
shells, is certainly a circumstance which, at the first blush, 
appears to justify their separation classically from the other 
Molluscans, but when we compare other characters, we shall 
find many that are common to both, particularly their nervous 
system, which is the same both in the Conchifers and Mollus- 
cans of Lamarck ; for neither of these exhibit a medullary 
ganglionic chord, but only dispersed ganglions which send 
forth the requisite nerves ; both have a double or bilobed man- 
tle, gills on each side, and a heart and circulation. The Cir- 
ripedes indeed seem to be of a higher grade, at least their nerv- 
ous system is more perfect — since they have a longitudinal 
spinal marrow with ganghons, a mouth furnished with toothed 
jaws disposed by pairs, ?ind jointed tendril-like organs about the 
mouth — and approaches near to that of the Annulose animals,* 
the Condylopes of Latreille. These, therefore, may be consid- 
ered as properly entitled to the denomination of a Class ; but 
should not be placed at a distance from the Crustaceans, to 
which Lamarck, with reason, thinks they make a near ap- 
proach, as they are by Cuvier and Carus. In fact, they seem 
to have little to do with the bivalve Molluscans, except in being 
defended by more than one shell, and having no head. 

I shall now mention the most prominent characters of those 



1 Mollusca acephala . 2 Cirripeda. 

3 Conchifera. 4 Annulosa. 



128 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. . 

shell-fish, that I regard as strictly entitled to the denomination 
of Molluscans. 

Animal soft, without articulations. Mantle bilobed, enve- 
loping more or less the animal. Crills varying. A heart and 
circulation. No medullary chord with ganglions, but a few 
scattered ganglions from which issue nerves to various parts. 
Body commonly defended by a calcareous shell, to which it 
adheres only by one or two points, but in some instances it is 
externally naked, and has an internal bone. 

The Molluscans may be divided into several families, and 
those of Cuvier are mostly natural, but as my plan has been to 
ascend from the lowest grade of animals towards the highest, 
I shall reverse this order, and begin my observations with the 
last of his famihes, or more properly speaking Orders, exclud- 
ing for the present the Cirripedes of Lamarck, or most of the 
multi valves of Linne, as leading off laterally towards the Crus- 
taceans. 

His first order he calls Acephales, or headless Molluscans, it 
includes all the bivalve shells of Linne, with the addition of the 
Pholads or stone-borers.^ Lamarck has divided it into two 
sections, which, regarding it as a Class, are with him Orders ; 
the first is Bimusctdar,^ having two attaching muscles, and two 
muscular impressions ; and the second is Unimuscular,^ having 
only one such muscle with one impression. With regard to 
their habits and economy, the bivalve, Molluscans may also be 
divided into two sections, the first of which may consist of those 
that inclose themselves either in a cell or burrow, or live in the 
mud, &c.; and the second of those that fix themselves to the 
rocks, stones, and other substances, by means of a Byssus, 
which they have the faculty of spinning from their foot or other 
part, or by a tendinous ligament which they protrude through an 
orifice in their shell. 

The general habit of the first family, including a vast vari- 
ety of forms, seems to be that of boring and burrowing, many 
piercing wood, and even rock, and others burrowing in the 
sand, sometimes to a great depth. Thus they are instructed 
by their instinct to form a convenient cell or other habitation, 
either constantly submerged, or only when the tide visits them, 
in which they are enabled to procure their destined food, of 
what nature does not appear to have been clearly ascertained, 
although probably animalcules, introduced when they inspire 

1 Pholas. 2 Conchijhcs dim\jnir(& 

3 C. monomtjaires. 



BIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 129 

ihe water for respiration, may form a principal portion of it, as 
the majority having no teeth for mastication, require a kind of 
nutriment for which it is not necessary : comparing this tribe 
of aquatic animals with fhose of the antecedent classes, we 
see the same object effected by different means. The sheathed 
polype^ builds a house of matter elaborated in its own stomach, 
while the ship-borer*^ pierces wood, and the stone-borer the 
rocks, and the razor-shell" burrows deep in the sand with the 
same view; and thus each is instructed by its Omniscient 
Creator, and fitted by its structure and organization, to accom- 
plish the intended purpose, but by different means and instru- 
ments. 

While each of these creatures has a particular and individual 
end in view, in its several proceedings, its own accommodation 
and appropriate nutriment and defence; the Creator, who has 
gifted them accordingly, makes use of them as instruments, 
which by their combined agency, though each, as it were, by 
a different process, accomplish, usually by slow degrees, His 
general purposes. This object, in the present instance, as 
well as in numerous others, seems to be to remove obstacles 
that stand in the way, and prevent certain changes willed by 
Providence, in the sea-hne of any country, from taking place. 
Rocks may be regarded as so many munitions of a coast, which 
prevent the encroachment of the ocean, but nothing can more 
effectually prepare the way for the removal of this safeguard, 
than its being, as it were, honey-combed by numberless stone- 
borers, that make it their habitation, thus it must be gradually 
rendered weaker; till it is no longer able to resist the impetus 
of the waves; the process is very slow, but it is sure; and it is 
worthy of remark, by what a seemingly weak organ most of 
these animals are enabled to effect this purpose, a fleshy foot, 
strengthened by no internal bone or gristle, but upon which 
they can turn as upon a pivot, and so in due time effect their 
destined purpose. 

I shall now proceed to furnish some examples of the manner 
in which this is effected: and give an account of some of each 
of these tribes, beginning with those, and they are numerous, 
that make the burrows in the sand to a considerable depth, so 
that it presents a less solid mass to the action of the waves. 

I shall first call the reader's attention to the proceeding of 
one usually denominated the razor-shell, from the supposed 
resemblance of some of the species to that instrument; in sub- 
stance and colour they are often like the human nail, and as 

1 See above, p. 80. n. 2. 2 Teredo. 3 Solen, 

R 



130 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

they, as well as the stone-borers, are stated to emit a phosphoric 
light, and also are eaten, it seems to me most probable that 
they are the animals and not the pholad as is usually supposed, 
which the Roman naturalist describes under the name Dadyle.^ 
These animals burrow in the sand, sometimes to the depth of 
two or three feet, and never quit the burrow unless by force. 
Poli says the collectors of them are accustomed to pour oil upon 
the water, which renders it quite transparent so that they can 
discern the razor-fish in its burrow by its tubes which are ex- 
erted. So powerful are its struggles, that, though they wind 
linen about their feet, they are often severely wounded by the 
sharp edges of their shells. The animal descends to the bot- 
tom of its burrow when the tide retires, and there remains till 
its return when it rises again. In order to take it, the fishermen 
are accustomed to cast into its retreat — which always remains 
open for respiration, and which is indicated by a little jet of 
water — a very little salt, this probably deceives the razor-fish 
and causes it to ascend, thinking the tide retmned. They 
bury themselves with wonderful celerity by the rapid action of 
their foot, and mount again by the combined action of that 
part and their smooth valves. The former is cylindrical and 
ends in a spherical summit of larger diameter than the rest of 
the foot.^ 

The common cockle^ is also a borer. Mr Osier, in a very in- 
teresting paper in the Philosophical Transactions for 1826, has 
described the way in which they bury themselves. The foot 
of the cockle, he observes, is very strong and stiflf, and is the in- 
strument by which they principaUy perform this operation ; but 
to look at it when unemployed, we cannot readily conceive 
how it can make a burrow capacious enough for so large a shell. 
Its point, indeed, is solid, and a viscid secretion from its surface 
enables it to fix itself more firmly in the sand, but this alone is 
not sufficient to accomplish this purpose, it is therefore further 
gifted with the power of distending it to a size, nearly equal- 
ling that of its shell — but how is this effected ? It has a tube, 
opening just within the mouth, which conveys to the foot the 
water by which the animal is enabled to distend it — thus the 
size of the boring auger becomes so nearly equal to that of the 
shells, that the solid point or bit first entering the sand, in time, 
by rotatory motions often repeated, works a burrow that receives 
the shell, and the animal is buried with only the extremity 
of its siphon emerging. How admirable is this contrivance 

1 See Appendix, note 23. 2 Plate V. Fia. 1. 

3 Cardium edule. 



BIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 131 

of Divine Wisdom to enable it to bury its shell, which it could 
scarcely otherwise accomplish. 

We easily comprehend the use of terrestrial burrowing ani- 
mals, by this habit they not only construct a habitation for 
themselves, but by the mould they throw out they help to fertil- 
ize and renew the soil; but with regard to the aquatic burrowers 
on the barren sands, which the tides submerge, we only see one 
end answered, the welfare of the individual who forms them: 
but they likewise doubtless answer some more general purpose 
connected with a plan of Providence which daily advances to- 
wards its completion, though we do not clearly comprehend 
what that end is. I was once conversing with a fisherman of a 
village on the N. E. coast of Norfolk on the subject of his trade, 
when amongst other matters he observed, that, from some al- 
teration in the sands of that coast the number of small shell fish 
had considerably diminished of late years, whicFi being the 
principal food of soles and other flat fish had occasioned a great 
diminution of them also. An over abundance of burrowing 
bivalves may undermine the beach to that degree, that the sea 
in high tides and stormy weather may make such a breach 
upon it as may carry away, or bury too deep, a large porportion 
of these shell fish, which would cause the fishes to leave the 
coast for one better provided with food for them. 

No animal has been more celebrated for the mischief it has 
occasioned as a timber-borer than that of which I shall next 
give some account. I am speaking of the ship-worm.^ Though 
the animal of some of the land-shells, as the snails,^ do him 
some injury in his garden, man seldom suffers very materially 
from their ravages, but the ship-worm, where it gets head, 
does him incalculable injury : destroying piles as far as they 
are under the water and every thing constructed of timber that 
is placed within their reach, to which they are as injurious as 
the boring wood-louse f they even attack the stoutest vessels, 
and render them unfit for service. Their object however is 
not to devour the timber, but with the same view that the 
pholads bore into the rock, to make for themselves a cell in 
which they may be safe from their enemies ; their food is pro- 
bably conveyed to them in the sea water. These animals 
cannot exist in fresh water, they pierce the wood by means of 
what Cams calls boring shells moved by a double-bellied mus- 
cle. The valves of the shells of this animal are emarginate 
or bilobed, both lobes are beautifully scored at the margin, but 
in diflferent directions, the furrows in one being much the finest 

1 Teredo navalis. 2 Helix. 3 Limnoria terebrans. 



132 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

and receiving those of the other. The mode in which these 
animals bore has not been ascertained, probably it is by the 
rotation of their valves. Sir E. Home describes them as pro- 
truding a kind of proboscis which has a vermicular motion, 
and which he supposes to act as a centre-bit while the creature 
is boring. The shells, by means of their ridges, probably act, 
like those of the pholads, as rasps. They bore in the direction 
of the grain of the timber, deviating only to avoid the track of 
others. 

Various are the animals whose function it is to attack sub- 
stances from which the vital principle is departed, nor are those, 
we see in the foregoing instance, which are submerged, always 
exempted from this law. Fortunately the aquatic animals, that 
prey upon timber, fall very far short of the terrestrial ones in 
iheir number and in the amount of the damage they occasion, 
and their aversion to fresh water is the safeguard of our bridges 
and other buildings that are erected upon piles — did an animal, 
with the boring powers of the ship-worm, enter our rivers and 
abound there, we should see the magnificent bridges that so 
much adorn our metropolis and are so indispensable to its in- 
habitants, gradually go to ruin — the vast stones with which 
they are built might become the habitation of pholads, and 
other rock-borers, and the communication between the two sides 
of the river greatly interrupted. But a merciful Providence 
has so limited the instincts of the different animals it has cre- 
ated, that they cannot overstep a'certain boundary, nor extend 
their ravages beyond the territory assigned to them. The law^ 
laid down to the ship-worm is to hasten the decay of timber, 
that is out of its place, and may be denominated an unsightly 
encroachment upon the ocean — this is the law they must obey, 
and they make no distinction, whether it is disowned by all, or 
an important and valuable part of man's property. Their in- 
dividual object, as has been stated above, is their own benefit, 
and they neither know that they obey a law of God, or injure 
man, but the Almighty by an irresistible agency impels them 
to it, and they fulfil the purposes of his Providence, at the same 
time that they provide for their own welfare.' 

The history of none of the boring bivalves is more interest- 
ing than that of the Pholads, or stone-borers. These animals 
are defended by two very fragile shells strengthened indeed by 
supplementary pieces, and rough like a file, inhabited by a 
very soft animal which appears to be furnished with no organs 
adapted lo boring so hard a substance as a rock. Wlien the 
young arc disclosed from the agf^, being cast upon the rock in 
whicli their mother resides, they bore a hole in it which they 



BIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 133 

enlarge daily, and which they never leave, unless compelled 
by force. This hole always communicates with the water, 
and is the orifice through which the animal exerts its double 
siphons; one of these siphons is its mouth and the other its 
anal orifice. Reaumur made some observations upon their 
mode of boring, he says, that it is by the rotation of the two 
valves of their shell which form a rasp, and continually wear 
away the rock which surrounds them. The surface of the 
valves of the shell is ridged longitudinally and transversely, 
and rough with asperities at the intersections of the ridges 
which seems to fit it for such an office, but still it is usually so 
tender and friable, that one would not expect it could act upon 
a rock, nor could it be by this agency that they first make an 
entry when young, or bore through shells, madrepores, and 
wood as they are said to do. They are stated principally to 
select calcareous rocks and sometimes hardened clay, which 
seem better adapted to the nature of their shells. Poli says 
they use their foot as an auger in excavating their crypts, the 
shell revolving upon it as upon an axis. 

Mr Osier, in the memoir before alluded to, states that the 
pholads can be observed to burrow only in the young state : 
and that they are found completely buried when so minute as 
to be almost invisible. The guiding hand of Providence ex- 
cites them from their very birth to fix themselves by their 
pointed foot, to erect their shells, and giving them a partial 
rotatory motion which employs the valves alternately, thus to 
enlarge their habitation, and this almost constantly, since the 
rapidity of their growth, for the first few weeks, compels them 
to act perseveringly in effecting that object, for the raspings of 
its crypt would clog the animal if they were left in it. When 
the siphon is distended with water, the animal, closing the ori- 
fices of its tubes, suddenly retracts them : thus a jet of water 
is produced which is prolonged by the gradual shutting of the 
valves, and clears the shell and the crypt. 

There is another family of bivalves which bores the rocks, 
the species of which are instructed by their Maker, to accom- 
plish their object by a very different process. I allude to La- 
marck's family of Stone-eaters.^ This family contains only two 
genera, removed from Venus, which he denoniinates Saxicave,^ 
and Petricole,^ the habits of which appear to be the same. M. 
Fieurian-de-Bellevue has described the proceedings of a spe- 
cies found in great numbers in submarine calcareous rocks 
near Rochelle. It lives like the pholads in crypts within the 

1 Les Lithophages. 2 Saxicava. 3 Petricola. 



134 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

rock, but as the crypt is not circular, it is clear it cannot be 
produced by a revolution of the animal upon its foot ; M. dc 
Bellevue, therefore, concluded that it dissolved the stone by 
means of a phosphoric acid transuding from its body. Some 
have thought, that did the animal secrete such an acid, it must 
have destroyed its shell, but since the rock round the crypt is 
found to be differently coloured from the rest, for a little thick- 
ness, and the animal does not frequent the argillaceous, basal- 
tic, and other rocks in the vicinity, but only the calcareous 
ones, M. Bellevue's opinion is rendered not improbable. It is 
surely very possible that the acid may be so mixed and tem- 
pered as to act upon the rock and not upon the shell. Mr 
Osier, in the memoir lately quoted, brings forward some very 
powerful additional arguments which confirm this opinion. 
The species which he observed was the rugose saxicave.^ This 
animal fixes itself by a byssus from the foot, and therefore can- 
not perform a rotatory motion, and it appears to have no me- 
chanical means of excavating its crypt — it can act solely upon 
the calcareous part of the rocks it perforates — for these and 
other reasons, Mr Osier is of the same opinion with M. de Bel- 
levue. 

Poli has described a stone-boring bivalve, belonging to the 
muscle genus, which perforates marble, each inhabiting a se- 
parate crypt, generally as large as the shell, and which he 
thinks they enlarge by fricton and rotatory motion. The pil- 
lars of the temple of Serapis at Puteoli w^ere perforated by these 
animals at the height of forty-six feet above the sea, whence it 
is probable they were so perforated before they were carried 
there.^ 

When we compare the proceedings of these four kinds of 
boring or burrowing MoUuscans, above described, with their 
forms, we shall find in them a particular adaptation of means 
to an end. In the ship-worm, whose province is to penetrate 
into submerged timber and there to take its abode, we find the 
anterior part of the body armed with two shelly valves, moved 
by strong muscles, which cut and rasp the substance upon 
which they act, so that it probably begins its labour as soon as 
it is born, introducing its narrow body, defended at the other 
extremity also by shell, into the timber softened by the water, 
and slowly increasing its crypt as its dimensions increase — in 
this case the most powerful action seems to be at the anterior 
end, though assisted, it may be, by some motion at the posle- 



I Saxicava rugosa. :i Toli, ii. 215. 



BIVALVE MOLLUSC ANS. 135 

rior. This kind of action appears best suited to its slender 
body. 

Let us next examine the pholads, all the genuine ones are 
rough like a rasp, strengthened near the base with accessory 
valves and a thick interior margin, indicating that here is the 
great action, and here it is that the foot revolves, thus main- 
taining a rotatory motion, causing the valves to act as files 
upon the walls of its crypt and thus to enlarge it when neces- 
sary ; perhaps this action may also be connected with its res- 
piration and nutriment ; it is probably very slow and gradual, 
so as not to injure the frail apex of its shells. 

In another rock-borer, of a form not suited to effect an ex- 
cavation by a rotatory motion, the deficiency, we see, is com- 
pensated for, and it effects its purpose by employing chemical 
agency when its crypt becomes too small for it. 

The sand-boring razor-shell above described, would be im- 
peded by a rough shell, in excavating its deep burrow, its 
valves therefore are smooth and polished, and its body very 
narrow, and consequently meets with less resistance in its mo- 
tion either upwards or dowmvards — while the cockles which 
do not bore to a great depth are differently constructed and 
proceed in a different manner. 

We next come to those bivalves which fix themselves to the 
rocks, or in other secure stations, by means of a Byssus, which 
is usually formed of brown silken threads, intertwined like 
wool, spun from the foot of the animal, formed from a slimy 
fluid furnished by a gland situated under its base. Poll says, 
with respect to the byssus of muscles, which have all of them 
this faculty, that it is of the same structure with hair, and that, 
at the extremities, it is furnished with little cups or suckers, by 
which it adheres so firmly, that the muscles can only be drawn 
from the water in great bunches. Some species are entirely 
enveloped with this substance. These provisions evidently in- 
dicate design and Creative Wisdom. 

The giant Clamp-shells^ belonging to the bimuscular section, 
sometimes four feet in length and weighing more than five 
hundred pounds, suspend their vast bulk by means of a strong 
byssus: below the hinge is a large opening, through which 
the animal passes a bundle of tendinous fibres, by which it is 
suspended to the rocks however large and weighty its shells, 
and thus it is enabled to fix itself securely, wherever its instinct 
directs it. 

1 Tridacne Gigas. 



136 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

These animals are said to be taken l>y means of a long pole, 
which is introduced between the valves of their shells when 
open; they immediately close them, and will not quit their 
hold, till ihey are landed. They are a principal article of food 
in the Moluccas, especially the young ones, which may be 
kept alive a long time. 

The wing-shell^ belonging to the unimuscular section, has 
long been celebrated, on more than one account, from a very 
early period. They are called wing-shells, or fin-shells, be- 
cause they are shaped somewhat hke a wing or fin, their Latin 
name (Pinna) is supposed to have been given them because of 
their resemblance to the plumes which the Roman soldiers 
wore in their helmets. They are sometimes very large, some 
are said to measure three feet in length: their substance dif- 
fers from that of most shells, being of a fibrous structure, and 
they appear to be formed of transverse imbricated laminae, they 
are also semi-transparent and very thin. Their byssus has 
been long celebrated, for it is mentioned by Aristotle.^ Its 
Creator has provided this animal, as we learn from Poll, with 
a pair of bifid muscles with which it spins this substance, w^hich 
emerges from the shell opposite the hinge ; like the thread of 
the muscle it terminates in a sucker, and with it the animal 
adheres to the rocks and other bodies which it meets with at 
the bottom of the sea, and thus they brave the agitation of the 
waters. They seldom change their station, but they can unfix 
their byssus, if any circumstance renders such change impera- 
tive. In Sicily and Calabria this byssus, which is very silky, 
is manufactured into stuffs, stockings, and gloves, which are 
very fine and warm, but it will take no dye: articles composed 
of it are very dear, and the manufacture is fast declining. 
Aristotle observed a little crustaceous animal within the valves 
of the wing-shell, vi/^hich he thought was necessary to its ex- 
istence. Pliny says it is always accompanied by a companion, 
the Pinnotheres or Pinnophylax, that when the Pimia opens its 
shell, a number of small fish boldly enter, and when it is full, 
the crab gives the blind animal notice by a slight bite, who 
immediately closes his shell, and assigns a portion of ihe prey 
to his little useful companion. Small Crustaceans indeed, both 
crabs and shrimps, certainly do find their way not only into 
the shells of the Pinna, but into those of muscles and whilks,' 
but their object is to defend themselves, especially when their 
crust is soft, and not to tell the Pinna when to close its doors 



I Pinna. 2 Sec Appendix, uoic 21. 

:] Ihtccinnm 



BIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 1S7 

upon its prey ; for its food is the sea water or the animalcules 
it contains. 

Many other bivalves, which I need not particularize, spin a 
byssus with their foot. Singular it is that the same office 
should be assigned to organs so differently situated in different 
animals. The spinnerets of the silk-worm, and other spinning 
moths are in the mouth, those of the spider in its tail, and those 
of various shell-fish in iheiv foot; in the first case, if we consi- 
der the various purposes to which caterpillars apply the faculty 
of spinning, we see the importance of ils being under the direc- 
tion of the eye of the animal: and even in tlie case of the spi- 
der, the eye directs the animal in its course to form its concen- 
tric circles, and the thread follows it ; and the same is the case 
when it spins the rays that traverse its web ; and when it de- 
descends from a height the same takes place. But the foot is 
the only organ that is so situated in bivalve shells, as to throw 
forth a thread that will go out of the shell, where it is wanted 
for use. 

Of all this tribe of shells none are more beautiful, both as to 
their form, painting, and sculpture, than what are called Escal- 
lop shells, or Comb shells^ from their resemblance, as to the 
scoring of the upper valve, to that instrument. These may 
be regarded as, in some degree, analogues of the butterflies 
amongst insects, and their flying as it were, on the surface of 
the water, as we shall soon see, increases the resemblance. 
There is, however, a difference between the Condylopes or 
annulose animals and the Molluscans, which must strike every 
examiner, the latter cannot be called symmetrical animals, 
while in the former the most perfect symmetry, both as to 
number of parts, and their structure, general form, sculpture 
and painting, prevails ; in the latter this general symmetry 
seems not to obtain ; in the bimuscular bivalves, indeed, the two 
shells are generally symmetrical both in form, size, and sculp- 
ture, but this does not invariably take place. In many of the 
ummusculars the upper shell differs from the under, eitlier in 
size or other particulars; in the escallop shells it is much flatter 
and more ornamented as to colouring ; and in the animal itself 
it is not a general principle that each part shall have its coun- 
terpart, or, if single, that the two sides shall exactly correspond. 
This furnishes some addition to the other proofs of the superi- 
ority of the Insect over the MoUuscan tribes ; symmetry, espe- 
cially of the external organs and parts, distinguishes all the 
higher classes from man downwards ; but is continued in the 

1 Pecien. 



138 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

invertebrate sub-kingdom no further than the Condylopes, 
when it is interrupted or altogether ceases. It must be ob- 
served, however, that in the animal of the univalves, a begin- 
ning of symmetrical organs appears in the tentacles, which are 
in pairs mutually corresponding, a circumstance not discover- 
able in the bivalves. 

The escallop shells were considered by Linne as belonging to 
the same genus with the oyster, which he regarded as a kind of 
rustic tribe belonging to it; but they not only differ widely in 
their shells, but also in the animal they contain. The mantle of 
the former is stated to be composed of two large membranes sur- 
rounded with long white hairs, and with pedunculated eyes: 
whence Poll denominated the animal of this shell ".^rg-its;" but 
these assuredly are not real eyes, but probably eye-like organs 
or tentacles, useful to the animal, perhaps, as organs of investi- 
gation and prehension, but not of vision. Lamarck, who does 
not, in loco, mention this formation of the animal of the escallop 
shells, observes that the Spondyls^ have the margin of the man- 
tle furnished with two rows of tentacular threads, a structure 
that seems to indicate some investigating office or prehensory 
function resident in that part, perhaps like the tentacles of the 
polypes they may seize animalcules. The animal of the oyster 
has nothing akin to this, a sufficient proof, added to their very 
different shells, that they belong to different genera. 

The French call these shells pelerines or pilgrims, they are 
also in catholic countries, especially in Spain and Portugal, 
called shells of St James, because the pilgrims to the shrine 
of St James of Compostella, in Galicia, were accustomed to 
ornament their cloak and hat with them. 

1 shall next make some observations upon the bivalve just 
mentioned, the oyster, which of all shell-fish, though it is one 
of the rudest and least sightly, has from every age been most 
in request, as a favourite article of food. Thi^gift of Provi- 
dence is widely dispersed, being found on the coasts of Eu- 
rope, Asia, and Africa; those that frequent our own are reck- 
oned the best of all. They are not a roving animal, but when 
they leave the matrix, they fix themselves to rocks or any sub- 
stance that falls in their way, which they seldom quit. Like 
other Molluscans, they are hermaphrodites, and are stated by 
Poli, the great luminary of conchology, to contain 1, 200,000 
eggs, so that a single oyster might give birth to 12,000 bar- 
rels !! Providence has thus taken care that the demands made 
upon them to gratify the appetite of his creature man, shall 

1 Spondylus. 



BIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 139 

not annihilate the race. Tliese also are the only shell-fish 
that man has thought it worth his while to cultivate, by keep- 
ing them in certain pits formed for the purpose, called amongst 
us beds, and to which the salt water is admitted only at high 
tides: and in these the green oysters are said to be produced; 
marine plants of that colour, the growth of which is favoured 
by the tranquillity of the water in these tanks, generate a vast 
number of seminiforra germs, which entering the shells of the 
oysterswhen they open them to take their food — so it is stated 
— stain them with their own hue. 

They have other enemies besides man : whoever has observed 
their shells will often see them quite covered with a small kind 
of sea-acorns.* It is related also that certain crabs get into 
their shells, first introducing a piece of stone to hinder them 
from shutting, but this is probably fabulous; they may, how- 
ever, when the oysters open their shells to receive the sea- water, 
enter them as they do those of the muscles and the wing-shell, 
either for protection or for the sake of food. It is observed that 
the oyster defends itself against intrusive enemies by squirting 
upon them with force water kept in reserve in their shells; 
they keep out those that attempt to pierce their shells to get 
at them, by thickening them in the part attacked. 

I shall next give some account of a bivalve that has inte- 
rested mankind from a very early period of history, on account 
of the valuable gem that it produces, and which is frequently 
mentioned in Holy Scripture. The Supreme Being, in his 
goodness and attention to the wants and tastes of his principal 
creature, has not neglected to furnish him with various articles 
for ornament as well as for use: and the most valuable of all 
possessions, the kingdom of grace in the heart, is symbolized 
by a pearl of great price ; and though the apostle charges fe- 
males not to adorn themselves with gold or pearls, but with good 
works, the meaning of the passage is, that the latter should 
have their ^r5i attention, not to forbid absolutely the use of the 
former — they are to adorn themselves not so much with gold 
or pearls as with good works — which ought to be the object of 
their most sedulous care. 

The animal that produces pearls in the greatest abundance, 
of the purest nature, and of the highest value, was by Linne 
classed with the muscles,^ but Lamarck has formed it into a 
distinct genus which he names Meleagrina. In this country 
it is usually called the pearl-oyster. It inhabits the Persian 
Gulf, the coasts of Ceylon, the sea of New Holland, the Gulf of 

1 BaloMus, &c, 2 MiftUus margaiiiiferus. 



140 , FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Mexico, and the coasts of Japan. It attains perfection no where 
but in the equatorial seas, but the pearl fishery in the island of 
Ceylon is the most celebrated and produclive; it is on the west 
coast, off the bay of Condatchy, where the country is very 
sandy and nearly without inhabitants, but on these occasions a 
populous town, with many streets a mile long, appears to have 
suddenly started up. The oystei beds or banks extend over a 
space thirty miles long by twenty-four broad. The twentieth 
of February is generally the day of rendezvous for the fisher- 
men. The fishery is commonly rented by a single individual, 
who is allowed to employ 150 boats for thirty daj^s, there are 
about 6000 boatmen and attendants. The oysters vary in 
their qualities according to the nature of the ground to which 
they are attached; and also in their number, by the action of 
the tides and other circumstances: those at the greatest depth 
produce the largest pearls, which are situated in the fleshy 
part near the hinge. Pearls consist of concentric coats of the 
same substance as that which forms the mother-of-pearl of the 
shell; they are produced by the extravasation of a lapidifying 
fluid, secreted in the organs of the animal and filtered by its 
glands. For one pearl that is found perfectly round and de- 
tached between the membranes of the mantle, hundreds of 
irregular ones occur attached to the mother-of-pearl like so 
many warts: they are sometimes so numerous that the animal 
cannot shut its shell, and so perishes. . The pearl is a formation 
forced upon the animal by some annoying substance in its 
shell, which it covers with mother-of-pearl, as the bees do in- 
trusive wasps with wax, to fix it or hinder it from affecting 
them by putridity, &c. Sir E. Home is of opinion that the 
abortive eggs of the animal are the nucleus upon which the 
pearl is formed, and he has made it very probable that this is 
often or generally (he case, but still the process just mentioned 
may take place when accixlental substances are introduced, 
and produce the warty excrescences, and sometimes loose mis- 
ehapen pearls. 

The diving tackle consists of a large stone suspended by a 
rope with a strong loop above the stone to receive one foot of 
the diver, and having also a slip-knot, and a basket formed of 
a hoop and network which receives (he o(.her foot. When he 
has fixed himself in (his tackle and is duly prepared, he holds 
his nostrils with one hand, and pulling the lunniui^-knot with 
the odier, instantly descends — when he reaches the bottom he 
disengages his foot from the stone, which is innnodiately drawn 
up to be ready for the next diver. He at the bottom throws 
himself on his face and collects cverv thing he can lay hold of 



BIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 141 

into the basket — when ready to ascend he jerks the rope and 
is speedily hauled up, and working himself up the rope he 
arrives at the surface sooner than the laden basket. A minute 
and half or two minutes are the utmost any diver remains un- 
der water. The shark-charmers form a necessary part of the 
company, by their incantations they are supposed to possess the 
power of preventing these voracious fishes from attacking the 
divers, and they will not descend without their attendance; 
where the bed is rich the diver often collects 150 oysters at 
one dip, but sometimes not more than five.^ It is said that a 
single diver will, in one day, often bring up from 1000 to 4000 
oysters. 

From the simple circumstance that Providence has instruct- 
ed this animal, which cannot eject from its shell those sub- 
stances, whether formed within itself, or that have accidental- 
ly entered, to encase them in the precious substance which it 
is empowered to secrete, what a vast fund of ornament to deck 
the most lovely part of the creation, and having no parallel in 
any gem that the earth produces, is provided. The pearls 
obtained from other shell-fish vary in colour — those from the 
wing-shell are brown, and those fi'om the fresh-water muscles 
greenish, but sometimes they are yellow, pink, bluish, and 
some are even black ; these last are very rare and dear. 

Other bivalves fix themselves by a tendinous ligament to 
the rocks. In one genus,^ in the upper valve near the hinge, 
is an aperture, closed by a kind of operculum formed at the 
dilated extremity ^f an internal muscle, it is by this operculum 
that the animal fixes itself. In another, related to the last,^ 
the beak of the lower valve turns up, overhanging in some 
degree the upper valve ; in this beak is a notch or aperture 
through which the fixing tendon passes ; aflfording an admira- 
ble instance of variation in the means of attaining the same 
end, when circumstances require it. It was necessary that 
the valves should not be reversed, a tendon through the lower 
valve secures this in the first of these animals ; but in the 
second, where the overhanging beak Avould interfere with this 
purpose, the tendon issues from the beak itself, so as to enable 
the animal still to fix itself with the proper valve downwards. 
In the Anomia the valve takes the form of the substance it is 
fixed to. 



1 Malte-Brun, Geogr. iii. 225. 2 Anomia, Pl. V. Fig. 2, 3. 

3 Terehratula, Pl. V. Fig. 4. 



142 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Who would think that these'headless animals, unprovided 
with organs that indicate any of the higher senses, as sight, 
smell, and hearing, and apparently fitted with no other means 
of motion than those of opening and shutting the valves of 
their shells, or travelling very slowly for a few inches, should 
yet be able not only to leap and use other motions, but occa- 
sionally to sail gaily on the surface of the ocean ; but, however 
improbable this may seem, it has been proved to be the case by 
the evidence of eye-witnesses of the fact. 

The common cockle,^ Poll says, can not only, by means of 
its foot turn round, or to either side, but even take a good leap. 
The Trigons,^ nearly related to the cockle, are mostly fossils, 
but there is one recent species, found on the coast of New 
Holland, called originally, from the pearly lustre of the inside 
of its shells, the pearl trigon,^ a name changed, without reason, 
by Lamarck. This, which was originally taken by Lesueur and 
since by Captain King, was more recently brought from thence 
by Mr Stutchbury, who told me, that they would leap over 
the gunwale of a boat in which he was, to the height of above 
four inches. The foot of this animal is bent at an acute angle, 
so, as upon pressure, to form a very elastic organ,* and that of 
the cockle is nearly the same. 

Those elegant shells of the Pectens, or comb-shells, have 
long been celebrated for their motions. PHny says, probably 
meaning these shells, that they leap and flutter out of the 
water, and dive. D'Argenville relates, that when they are 
on shore, they regain the water by opening the valves of their 
shells as wide as they can and then shutting them briskly, 
by which they acquire sufficient elasticity to rise three or four 
inches, and thus proceed till they accomplish their object. 
Most probably the foot assists in producing these leaps. Their 
progression in the water is described as very different; when 
they rise to the surface — but the means by which they do this 
has not been clearly explained — they support themselves half 
under water. They next open their shells, to which they 
communicate such a vibration, that they acquire a very brisk 
movement from right to left, which enables them, as it were, 
to run upon the water. 

The tuhp-shell,'' when it walks, if I may so speak, opens 
and shuts its valves, and at the same time lengthens and 
shortens its foot, which seems to indicate a connexion, or ac- 
tion, between the former and the latter organs, similar to what 

1 Cardium v.didc. 2 Triffonia. '^ T. margarilacea. 

4 Plate V. Fig..*). 5 TcUimi. 



BIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 143 

has been observed to take place in insects, and perhaps points 
out some analogy between the valves of the shell and the 
upper wings, or elytra of insects, and the mantle and their 
under wings. 

Bosc states, that the animals of the genus Venus, in calm 
weather, may be seen sailing on the surface of the waters, 
using one of their valves as a boat and the other as a sail. 
As these are usually rather heavy shells, they must be fur- 
nished with some means of rendering themselves lighter than 
the water. Pliny, of old, mentions shells dedicated to Venus, 
which sail and oppose their concave part to the wind. 

Thus we see the Creator has given even to these apparently 
stupid and inactive creatures means of enjoyment, that every 
one is not aware of ; and powers of locomotion, of which, at 
first sight, they seem incapable. 

I might enlarge here on the admirable contrivance and 
variety observable in the hinge, as it is called, by means of 
which the animals are enabled to open and shut the valves of 
their shells ; upon the sculpture and colours that distinguish 
many of them, particularly amongst the unimusculars, but 
this chapter is already too long, and enough has been said to 
prove that they have in no respect been neglected or over- 
looked by the Almighty Being who willed their existence, and 
who is ever watchful over the creatures of his hand, to provide 
them with all things necessary for their being, consistently 
with the ends he created them to serve. 



CHAPTER IX. 

Functions and Instincts. Univalve Molluscans. 

The Univalve shells of the Swedish naturahst, a term adopted 
from Aristotle's Monothyra, are next to be considered ; these, 
with the mnltivalve Chitons form the Gastropods, or shell-fish 
using their belly for a leg, of Cuvier ; and with the cuttle-fish 
and nautilus tribe constitute Lamarck's Class of JlfoZZit^cans. 
The latter author divides his Class into five orders, four of 
which belong to the tribe I am considering. 

1. Pteropods (wing-footed); furnished with organs only for 
swimming and sailing.^ 

2. Gastropods (belly-footed) ; body straight, never spirally 
convolved; a muscular foot for creeping under the belly. 

3. Trachelipods (neck-footed); greatest part of the body 
spirally convolved, always inhabiting a spirivalve shell; foot 
free, attached to the neck, formed for creeping. 

4. Heteropods (diverse-footed) ; no coronet of arms; no sub- 
ventral, or subjugular foot; fins, one or more, not disposed in 
pairs.^ 

As the Cephalopods, forming Lamarck's fourth Order, may 
be regarded rather as constituting a larger division or Sub-class 
of the Molluscans, than an Order, I shall consider them in a 
separate chapter. 

I. Proceeding from one of the above Orders to another, I 
shall select such individuals, belonging to it, as appear to ex- 
emplify the great attributes of their Creator, eitlier in their 
structure, forms, habits, or instincts. The animals of the first 
Order, like the long celebrated Argonaut and Nautilus, enliven 
the surface of the ocean in fine weather, where they steer their 
little barks through, between, and over its lluctuating waves, 
and spread their membranous sails to the soft breathing of the 
zephyrs. 

One of the most noted animals of the tribe is known by the 
appellation of the Boreal Clio, which, like the jelly-fish, has a 
gelatinous body, is defended by no shell, and aflbrds food to 

I Tlate V. Fu;.(i, 7 '2 Fig. 8 



UNIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 145 

the whales and other fishes, as well as to the sea-hirds. This 
animal is abundant in places that suit i(, and appears only 
-during the warmest hours of the day on the surface. 

Other genera of this Order are covered by a shell or shells. 
Of this kind is the genus Hyalma, so named from its semi- 
transparent shell, which w^ears the appearance of a bivalve willi 
soldered valves, the upper one being the largest; this difference 
of size of the seeming valves causes an aperture tlirough which 
the animal sends forth two large yellow and violet wings, or 
sails, rounded and divided at their summit into three lobes. 
The head in this genus is almost evanescent, so that both shell 
and head exhibit an easy transition from the acephalous or 
bivalve Molluscans to those which have a head. When its 
wings or sails are unfolded it moves with great velocity on the 
surface of the sea. The animals of this Order, both from the 
beautiful colouring of their filmy sails or wings, and from their 
number and symmetry, are better entitled to the appellation of 
the butterflies of the ocean, than the escallop shells which have 
sometimes been so called. The mantle of the bivalves be- 
comes an organ of very different use in the Pteropods; for they, 
having no means of fixing themselves like most of the bivalves, 
float continually in the ocean; to compensate for this want, as 
in innumerable other instances, their Creator has given them 
the power of expanding this organ as a sail, both for motion 
and to give some direction to their course ; it is attached to the 
mouth or neck, and is connected in some species with their 
respiration. Nothing certain is known with respect to their 
food: probably they absorb the animalcules swarming in the 
sea water. 

2. The series of Gastropods begins with animals that have 
no shell, amongst which the most remarkable seem to be the 
Scyllxa and the Tethys, both known to Linne, and by him 
described. The former is an oblong gelatinous animal, late- 
rally compressed, elevated above in the middle, where it has 
two pair of membranous wings or fins. Its inferior surface is 
hollowed out longitudinally, by means of which, and its tenta- 
cles, it can embrace the stems of the fuci or sea-wrack, the 
flowers of which it eats. It is described as moving very slowly 
in the water by bending its extremities. It swims on the sur- 
face when the weather is calm, but adheres to the floating fuci 
when the sea is agitated, so that the kindness and foresight of 
its Maker — by giving it wings, for independent motion, and 
means to adhere to the fuci, when support is necessary to it, 
or it takes its food — has thus provided amply for its enjoy- 
ment and sustenance. The great peculiarity of the latter, the 

T 



146 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Tethys, is a mantle which extends above and beyond the head, 
like that of some marine goddess, conceahng it entirely, and 
forming an ample veil, fringed or undulated at its margin. 
By the help of this veil they elevate themselves to the surface, 
and probably sail on the waters. This animal is nearly related 
to the Laplysia^ a kind of sea-slug, like which it lives in muddy 
places, and ejects a black fluid; it is very fetid, and its flesh is 
poisonous. It only rises to the surface in the hot season. 

I shall next notice a tribe of Gastropods, which at first sight, 
considering the number of pieces of which their shelly covering 
is composed, seems to belong to the multivalves, amongst 
which Linne has placed it. It will be readily perceived that 
I am speaking of the Chiton, or coat-of-mail shell, but when 
the animal that it covers is examined, it will be found that, 
notwithstanding its multivalve shell, it really belongs to the 
Crastropods. 

These animals are generally found under stones, sometimes 
they adhere to the surface of rocks, and sometimes conceal 
themselves in their fissures: they often traverse vast tracts of 
ocean fixed to the keels of ships, like some of the limpets they 
fix themselves a good way out of the water, so as only to be 
wetted when the tide is up, and sometimes above high water 
mark. Poli says that when they resist any attempt to force 
them from their station, they expel the air and water on all 
sides and produce a vacuum, so that it is very difficult to over- 
come the pressure of the atmosphere; and Mr Frembly, who 
had an opportunity of studying their habits on the coast of 
Chili, states that when not apprehensive of danger their attach- 
ment is very slight, and by pushing them gently they will 
easily slide from the surface to 'which they are attached, but if 
a direct attempt is made to unfix them by force, they will part 
with a portion of their shells sooner than let go their hold. 

When we consider that these animals are not only often ex- 
posed to the violent action of the waves, but also to the attack 
of countless enemies, we see abundant reason for the coat of 
mail with which their Creator has covered them. Even the 
fleshy or cartilaginous margin, or zone, as my lamented friend 
the Rev, Lansdown Guilding, in his admirable memoir on this 
tribe, denominated it, is defended sometimes by scales, spines, 
and bristles, at others rough with numerous little bony tuber- 
cles; it is also described as in general fringed, so that when 
the animal attaches itself to a rock, or stone, it is altogether 
calculated, by the application of the prone part of its body, to 
produce a vacuum. The wing-shcil and other bivalves tiiat 
suspend themselves by a byssus, are suftlcieutly protected by 



UNIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 147 

their shells from the attack of their enemies, without so com- 
plete an adhesion of the body as is necessary for the coat-of- 
mail shell. Mr Guilding, who had excellent opportunities of 
observation, informs us that these animals are night-feeders, 
remaining stationary as above, during the day; reasoning from 
analogy he suspects they feed on marine plants, the sea-wrack, 
&c. These creatures slide along very slowly, if accidentally 
reversed, they recover a prone position by the violent motions 
of the ligament or zone that surrounds them, and if alarmed 
they sometimes roll themselves up like w^oodUce. 

Lamarck proceeds immediately from the Cliitonidans to the 
Patellidans or Limpets,^ which also fix themselves so firmly to 
the rock, that it requires considerable force to separate them, 
and sometimes in such numbers that their surface seems quite 
covered by them. The transition from the former tribe to this, 
with no intermediate links, seems at first sight violent, and 
their right to be associated in the same family rather problem- 
atical: probably intermediate species will come to light which 
will render this point more evident than the shell of these ani- 
mals appears to indicate. 

With regard to their functions and the part assigned to them 
in the great plan of creation, little is known ; probably, from 
their numbers in some parts, they may help to soften the rocks, 
so that they may, at some destined hour, yield more readily tc^ 
the force of the winds and waves; thus they may be enumer- 
ated amongst the instruments which the Creator employs to 
effect his purposes, and such changes in the coast of any coun- 
try, as he wills shall take place. 

They afford a beautiful instance of the gradual progress of 
Creative Wisdom from form to form. If the student of the 
tribe looks with inquiring eye at a collection of the Patellidans, 
or limpets, in the flattest and most depressed of them^ he will 
find no small resemblance to one of the valves of a bivalve shell, 
he will soon, however, discover a prominence in it, the first 
tendency towards the spiral convolution, a little removed from 
its centre, Vv^hich will prove to him that it belongs to a very 
different tribe; looking again at others that are more elevated 
and conical,^ he will see the same prominence or beak forming a 
more striking feature, and ascertaining these shells to be uni- 
valves, he will find, upon a comparison of them with the nerit,^ 
the snail,^ or the periwinkle,® that this umbo or knob is analo- 

1 Patella. 2 Umbrella indica. 

3 FateUavuigata 4 JVerita, JVeritina, &c 

5 Helix. 6 Turbo. 



148 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

gous to the spiral part of those shells, as he will see upon 
examining one of the bonnet-hmpets,^ in which he will detect 
an incipient decurved spire; passing from this by one of the 
chambered-hmpets,^ it will lead him to the neritidans, or top- 
shells, from which the road is direct to the sea-ear;^ and by 
another* he arrives almost immediately at the periwinkles and 
snails. If he chance to examine further between the limpets 
and the whelks,* he will find another open shell,^ which forms 
the path to the latter genus. If once more his eye happens to 
observe a shell almost open^ but with the sides a little turned 
in, he will see still another road leading by the dippers^ to the 
elegant tribe of cowries.^ It is by this road that Lamarck 
travels to them. Again, he may perhaps be shown, preserved 
in spirits, an animal whose respiratory orifice is covered by a 
round shield — this is the sea-slug, ^° an animal famous for Pliny's 
legend of its noxious qualities, whose head resembles a hare, 
which leads from the Patellidans towards the common slug of 
our gardens. ^^ To the bivalves there seems to be also a road 
from this central group, by a Norwegian shell described by 
Miiller as an anonmlous species of limpet, but which by La- 
marck is considered to be a bivalve.^^ The lower valve in this 
genus is so thin that Miiller overlooked it ; by it the animal 
adheres to marine bodies — the upper valve, like the Patella, is 
sub-conical with a prominent vertex, and the two valves are 
not connected by a hinge. 

A due consideration of all these circumstances, of this ra- 
diation, as it were, from a typical form as a centre, by various 
roads towards different tribes, seems to prove, and the observa- 
tion is confirmed by facts in other departments of nature, that 
the world of animals, as well as that of heavenly bodies, consists 
of numerous systems each, so to speak, with its central orb, 
and all concatenated, and revolving as it were wheel within 
wheel, and all tending towards or branching from a common 
centre. It seems, in the present instance, taking the group 
expressed by Patella of Linne as the common centre, that from 
thence, though by different and diverging routes, we may ar- 
rive at almost every molluscan group or tribe. 

The Molluscans that we have hitherto been considering, 

1 Pileopsis uv^aricay &c. 2 Crepidula. 

3 Haliotis. 4 Cahjptrcea. 

5 Buccinum. 6 Concholepas Peruvians 

7 BtdltBa. 8 Bulla. 

9 CyprcEa. 10 Laph/sia depilans 

11 Limax. 12 Orbicula J^orioegica 



UNIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 149 

with the exception of the herbivorous chitons, derive their nutri- 
ment from the sea water itself, either from animalcules or other 
marine substances requiring only absorption, but the Gastro- 
pods that we are next to notice live upon more solid food, and 
such as cannot be digested without a more powerful action 
upon it. Of this description are the dippers^ which are fur- 
nished with a singular organ or gizzard that proves their preda- 
ceous or carnivorous habits; the remaining genera are herbi- 
vorous, but as they exhibit no very interesting traits I shall 
proceed to the next Order. 

The TrachelipodSf constituting Lamarck's third Order of 
Molliiscans, may be divided into those that are herbivorous, 
and those that are carnivorous^ the first having no respiratory 
.siphon, with which the others are furnished. 

The herbivorous Trachelipods may be sub-divided into ter- 
restrial and aquatic, and the latter into those that inhabit fresh 
water or salt. It is not known that any of the predaceous 
ones are terrestrial. The terrestrial ones not only devour the 
leaves and stems of plants, but some also attack their roots, 
one species, defended by an operculum or mouth-cover, devours 
those of the violet.^ Others of this tribe are found on trees, 
under moss, or feeding on the lichens ; the shells of some of these 
are what are called turrited^ or long and slender, with spiral 
whirls, resembling, in miniature, a lofty tower with a spiral 
straircase winding round it. By this attenuated structure their 
motions, in their close retreats, are less impeded. As it is in 
this tribe of univalves that the organ just mentioned, the oper- 
culum, or mouth-piece, first makes its appearance, it will not 
be improper here to give some account of it. 

If we survey the various tribes of shell-bearing animals we 
find them defended from the injuries or attacks, to which their 
situation exposes them by various expedients, all of them indi- 
cating Power and Wisdom in their contrivance and formation, 
and Goodness in their end. These animals themselves all 
have a soft body furnished with organs of different kinds, suited 
to their station and purposes. Those that are below them in 
the scale, especially the naked Polypes, and gelatinous Radi- 
aries, are still more frail and evanescent, but their organization 
is so inferior, that it is probably less subject to derangement 
from external accidents, or injuries are sooner remedied, than 
in that of the shell-fish — which, unless they were clad in some 
kind of mail, would probably soon perish. Accordingly • we 

1 Bulla. 2 Cyclostoma elegans. 3 Clatisilia. 



150 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

find some protected by a multivalve tubular shell,* the inhabi- 
tant protruding its organs at the summit, which is defended by 
an operculum consisting of more than a single piece — in others, 
also, the shell is multivalve, but the animal protrudes itself at 
the sides, and has no operculum, as in the common barnacle.^ 
Others, again, are protected by a shell consisting of two valves, 
open at one or two ends, and these seek further protection 
either by burying themselves in the sand or perforating the 
rocks, or by suspending themselves by a byssus ; others, again, 
which only open their shells at certain times, as the oyster, fix 
themselves to any convenient substance. To these succeed 
others, whose shell is transversely divided into many pieces,^ 
but yet, taken together, it forms a single valve protecting the 
back of a gastropod, or slug-like animal, which for further pro- 
tection, when it is not moving, and to supply the place of a 
lower valve, fastens itself to a rock or other substance. 

With the Patellidans begin the undivided univalve shells, 
which like the preceding animals protect their lower side by 
fixing themselves to the rocks ; the sea-ears,* which are still 
more open, have recourse to a similar mode of protecting them- 
selves, they preserve a communication with the atmosphere or 
water without elevating their shells, by means of a line of aper- 
tures, under the thickest margin near the apex ; these aper- 
tures begin when the animal is young near the spire, and as it 
grows it stops up one and opens another, as its occasions re- 
quire. I have a very large specimen, in which there are tiaces 
of eighteen apertures, and all but six are stopped up. If we 
turn our eyes from these to the Buccinidan or Whelk tribe, we 
are struck by an open Peruvian shell, which at first sight seems 
like a limpet,^ but upon inquiry we find that it is defended by 
an operculum, the plan of protection being here changed, and, 
instead of an under-valve, or a rocky munition, it is closed by 
a broad plate, which some peculiarity in its structure and organ- 
ization doubtless required ; from this by Purpura and JMoiw- 
ceros to the true Buccinum, the mouth narrows and the opercu- 
lum with it. 

If we examine the common periwinkle, we find the moulh 
of its shell closed by a horny organ called the patch, which is 
attached to the foot or rather neck, by its convex or lower sur- 
face, sitting on a sub-triangular flat space spirally convoluted ; 
this is the operculum, and if examined on cither side will be 
foiuid to be also spirally convolulcd, proving that it is formed 

1 liithinvs. Vubictnclla. 2 PciiliUi.^viis. •» ^ liiton 

1 HaliuLis. r> Concholrpas. 



UNIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 151 

by the part on which it sits. When the animal expands its 
foot for creeping, the operculum is retracted within the shell, 
so as to be quite out of the way. If we examine the opercula 
of other shells, we shall find that the majority of them have 
the same spiral configuration traced both on the upper and 
lower surface. In most that I have seen the intervals of the 
whirls increase in width, as the spires of the shells do from the 
base to the mouth. In the top-shell^ the whirls are perfectly 
regular and nearly equidistant. They vary much in thickness ; 
I have one three-fourths of an inch thick, while those of the 
top-shell and periwinkle are very thin. In some of the thick 
ones, on the under side the convolutions are very convex, and 
sometimes elevated into concentrical ridges. Some underneath 
have a forest of obtuse elevations, and many are rough with 
minute tubercles. As to substance some are horny, while 
others resemble the shell; others are horny externally and 
shelly internally. If these formations on the under side, as in 
the common periwinkle, represent the shape of the part of the 
neck to which they are attached, as they most probably do, it 
must act the part of a mould, upon which the operculum is 
formed from its mucus, and increased as the aperture enlarges. 

Lamarck is of opinion that the shell of univalves is formed 
in a similar way upon the neck of the animal, which in the 
Murices or rock-shells, and other tribes distinguished by spines 
or tubercles, has certain fleshy processes which produce those 
spines, &c. and is withdrawn when they have acquired consist- 
ence enough not to bend when thus left to themselves. Other 
conchologists, particularly one of the most eminent of our times, 
Poli, think that the shells of univalves are organized bodies, 
and produce their spines as vegetables do their prickles, he says 
also that their shells contain cellular membranes almost like a 
Rete mucosum. 

In the progress of a shell's growth, as new spines are formed 
old ones drop off, how this is effected seems not to be accounted 
for by either hypothesis — it is anologous, however, in a great 
degree, to what was mentioned above with regard to the holes 
in the shell of the sea-ear, only that with them an old hole is 
stopped up, when a new one is formed. All that can be said 
on the subject is that the animal, instructed by Providence, 
as new processes are formed and a new whirl of its shell com- 
pleted, is enabled to throw off* by a solvent, or some other 
means unascertained, those that are no longer wanted. 

It is observable that the terrestrial univalves,^ of this Order, 

1 Trorhus. 2 Helix, &c. 



152 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

are never armed with spines, tubercles, or other elevations, but 
exhibit generally a levigated shell. As they move about usu- 
ally amongst bushes, under moss, or in grass, the object of the 
Creator in this structure was probably that their motions might 
not be impeded by any roughness of their shell. 

Mr E. W. Brayley, in a very ingenious memior, in the 
Zoological Journal, has contended, with considerable strength 
of argument, that the movable black points, in the upper ten- 
tacles of snails, though he allows they may be their analogues, 
are not real eyes ; but the Rev. L. Guilding, in a subsequent 
part of the same Journal states, that the large strombs of the 
Caribbean sea have eyes furnished with iris and pupil, similar to 
those of birds and reptiles — that they have also a vitreous and 
aqueous humour, and a black pigment, which certainly prove 
them to be real eyes — their organ of hearing, he thought, was 
likewise distinct. The cowries also are said to have eyes ex- 
hibiting both iris and pupil, as have some volutes.^ 

Giving these facts their due weight, I think we may con- 
elude that the, so called, eyes of snails, are real though imper- 
fect visual organs. It appears to be the plan of the Creator, 

to ascend 

From small beginnings to a glorious end. 

An organ is, as it were, sketched out, in the lowest animal, as 
for instance, a nervous system, which keeps developing and 
improving till it is brought to its acme in the highest : first we 
find in the polypes no nervous centre, but molecules every 
where dispersed; then the next form is a nervous collar round 
the oesophagus; next dispersed ganglions; then a ganglionic 
chord ; and so on till we arrive at a regular brain and spinal 
marrow incased in a vertebral column. We may with reason 
therefore conclude, that the organ of vision, when first planted, 
would be a mere rudiment, though sufficient for the animal's 
purposes, and possessing few of the characters it exhibits when 
arrived at its most perfect form ; these it keeps acquiring, as it 
becomes more developed, or to avoid misconception from nib- 
bling critics, the Creator keeps giving it more and more perfect 
sight till he brings it forth, in all its glory, in the highest ani- 
mals. 

The most common in this country of these herbivorous 
Trachelipods, is the garden-snail," but the species whose history 
has been most copiously related, is that called in France the 

1 Vohiia Etfiiopirn, Pi. \Tr.\}.Fjc,. \. a. 'J Ihli.i /nutrusis 



UNIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 153 

Escargot,^ wFiicli, though stated to have been originally import- 
ed into this country, now abounds in some parts of Surry and 
othersouthern counties. I shall begin by giving some account 
of their economical and tlien of their physical history. 

On the continent, especially in France, this large snail, 
which is more than double the size of our garden one, is used 
as an article of food, and though said not to be easy of digestion, 
is very palatable. They are thought to be in best season in 
the winter, when they are hybernaiing, and covered with their 
temporary calcareous operculum, which falls off in the spring. 
The Romans appear to have fattened these snails, in places 
appropriated for that purpose. Pliny mentions several sorts 
that were kept separate, and amongst others white ones that 
were found in the neighbourhood of Rieli. The Illyrian snails 
he describes as the largest ; the African as most prolific ; others 
from Solelum, in the Neapolitan territory, as the noblest and 
best: he speaks of some as attaining to so enormous a size, 
that their shells would contain eighty pieces of money of the 
common currency.^ Bruguieres, to whom conchology is under 
very great obligations, is of opinion that, by cultivation, the 
several species of snails might be brought to a much greater 
size, and furnish an abundant, wholesome, and even delicate 
aliment. There is no reason why the species of this genus, 
which feed on vegetable substances, should not be as palatable 
as the oyster or periwinkle. 

Snails, in general, are hermaphrodites, or unite both sexes 
in the same individual : this is the case with the great major- 
ity of MoUuscans ; the object of Providence, in this kind of 
organization, is evidently the greater multiplication of the spe- 
cies, but though hermaphrodites, in each individual possessing 
the organs of both sexes, they are not so as to sexual union ; 
reproduction can only take place when different individuals 
impregnate each-0lher; this union takes place at the begin- 
ning of the spring, sooner or later, according to the heat of 
the season. Their court ship is singular, and realizes the Pa- 
gan fable of Cupid's arrows, for, previous to their union, each 
snail throws a winged dart or arrow at its partner. About 
twenty days after coupling the snails lay, at different times, a 
great number of white eggs, varying at each laying from 
twenty-five to eighty, as large as little peas, enveloped in a 
membranous shell, which cracks when dried. They lay these 
eggs in shady and moist places, in hollows which they exca- 
vate with their foot, and afierwards cover with the same organ. 

I f/. Pomatia. 2 Q^uadrans. 

U 



154 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

These eggs hatch, sooner or later, according to the tempera- 
ture, producing little snails exactly resembling their parent, 
but so delicate that a sun-stroke destroys thern, and animals 
feed upon them ; so that few, comparatively speaking, reach 
the end of the first year, when they are sufficiently defended 
by the hardness of their shell. The animal, at its first exclu- 
sion, lives solely on the pellicle of the egg from which it was 
produced. Providence, which in oviparous and other animals, 
has provided for the first nutriment of the young in different 
ways, appropriating the milk of the mother to the young of 
quadrupeds; the yolk of the egg to those of birds, tortoises, and 
lizards ; and the white of the egg to frogs and toads, has made 
this pellicle or coat the best nutriment of the young snail. In 
fact, this pelhcle, consisting of carbonate of lime, united to 
animal substance, is necessary to produce the calcareous secre- 
tion of the mantle, and to consolidate the shell, as yet too soft 
for exposure. When this envelope is eaten, the little snail 
finds its nutriment, more or less, in the vegetable soil around 
it, and from which it continues to derive materials for the 
growth and consolidation of the shell. It remains thus con- 
cealed for more than a month, when it first issues forth into 
the world, and without respect of persons, attacks the vegeta- 
ble productions around, returning often to an earthly aliment, 
probably still necessary, for the due growth and hardening of 
its portable house. These snails cease feeding when the first 
chills of autumn are felt, and associating, in considerable num- 
bers, on hillocks, the banks of ditches, or in thickets and 
hedges, set about their preparations for their winter retreat. 
They first expel the contents of their intestines, and then con- 
cealing themselves under moss, grass, or dead leaves, each 
forms, by means of its foot, and the viscid mucus which it se- 
cretes, a cavity large enough to contain its shell. The mode 
in which it effects this is remarkable ; collecting a considerable 
quantity of the mucus on the sole of its foot, a portion of earth 
and dead leaves adheres to it, which it shakes ofi'on one side; 
a second portion is again thus selected and deposited, and so 
on till it has reared around itself a kind of wall of sufiicient 
height to form a cavity that will contain its shell ; by turning 
itself round it presses against the sides and renders them smooth 
and firm. The dome, or covering, is formed in the same way : 
earth is collected on the foot, wliich then is turned upwards, 
and throws it off by exuding fresh mucus ; and this is repeated 
till a perfect roof is formed. Having now completed its win- 
ter house, it draws in its foot, covering it with the mantle, and 
opens its spiracle to draw in the air. On closing ihis, it forms 



UNIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 155 

with its slime a fine membrane, interposed between the mantle 
and extraneous substances. Soon fifierwards the mantle se- 
cretes a large portion of very white fluid over its whole surface, 
which instantly sets uniformly, and forms a kind of solid oper- 
culum like plaster of Paris, about half a line in thickness, 
which accurately closes the mouth. When this is become 
hard the animal separates the mantle from it. After a time, 
expelling a portion of the air it had inspired, and thus being 
reduced in bulk, it retreats a little further into the shell, and 
form^ another leaf of mucus, and continues repeating this ope- 
ration till there are sometimes five or six of these leaves form- 
ing cells filled with air between it and the operculum. 

The membranous partitions are more numerous at the end 
than at the beginning of winter, and, in snails inhabiting the 
mountains, than in those on the plains. These animals hy- 
bernate at the proper period, at very different temperatures, 
varying from 37° to 77° Fahrenheit. Respiration ceases during 
the period of hybernation. 

The mode in which these animals escape from their winter 
confinement is singular: the air they had expired on retiring 
into their shell further and further, remains between the dif- 
ferent partitions of mucus membrane above mentioned, which 
forms so many cells hermetically sealed ; this they again in- 
spire, and thus acquiring fresh vigour, each separate partition, 
as they proceed, is broken by the pressure of the foot, projected 
in part through the mantle ; when arrived at the operculum 
they burst it by a strong effort, and finally detaching it, then 
emerge, begin to walk and to break their long fast.^ 

In all these proceedings the superintending care and wise 
provisions of a Father Being are evident. This creature can 
neither foresee the degree of cold to which it may be exposed in 
its state of hybernation, nor know by what means it may se- 
cure itself from the fatal effects it would produce upon it, if not 
provided against. But at a destined period, often when the 
range of the thermometer is high, not stimulated by a cold 
atmosphere, except, perhaps, by the increasing length of the 
night, at the bidding of some secret power, it sets about erect- 
ing its winter dwelling, and employing its foot both as a shovel 
to make its mortar, as a hod to transport it, and a trow^el to 
spread it duly and evenly, at length finishes and covers in its 
snug and warm retreat; and then still further, to secure itself 
from the action of the atmosphere, with the slimy secretion 
with which its Maker has gifted it, fixes partition after parti- 

1 Gaspard and Bell, Zool. Jour. i. 93.— ii. X74. 



156 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

tion, and fills each cell formed by it, with air, till it has re- 
treated as far as it can from every closed orifice of its shell — 
and thus barricades itself against a frozen death. Again, in 
the spring, when the word is spoken — awake, thou that sleepest 
— it begins imniedialely to act with energy, it reinspires, as 
above related, the air stored in its cells, bursts all its cerements, 
returns to its summer haunts, and again lays waste our gar- 
dens. 

We may observe here, with respect to this and all hybernat- 
ing animals, a beautiful relation and correspondence between 
their habits and their functions. Their official duty is to re- 
move superfluities and nuisances, to prevent vegetable sub- 
stances from encroaching too much upon^ach other, to remove 
entirely those that are dead and putrescent. At the season of 
the year, therefore, when the former are in full vigour, forth 
issue from their various retreats the innumerable tribes that 
make them their food, but when they cease to grow and flou- 
rish these services are not wanted, and the animals who per- 
form them disappear from the face of nature. Again, when 
dead animals, or the excrements of living ones, or the sweets 
issuing from innumerable flowers, would clog the air that we 
breathe with effluvia unfriendly to health and life — countless 
armies are every where upon the wing, or on the alert, to prey 
upon such substances, and prevent their miasmata from breed- 
ing a pestilence amongst us ; but when the cold season returns, 
the flowers lose their leaves and blossoms, and exhale no longer 
their sweets, and the scents arising from putrescent and other 
foetid substances become no longer annoying. Then the whole 
army employed in this department disappears, and the face 
of nature seems to lose the most busy part of its population, 
gone to a long repose. 

It is worthy of remark, with respect to the terrestrial ani- 
mals of the tribe we are considering, that they all delight in 
shady and moist places, and that during hot and dry weather 
they seldom make their appearance, but no sooner comes a 
shower, than they are all in motion. It is probable that their 
power of motion is impeded by a dry soil, and that the grains 
of earth and small stones, when quite dry, adhere to their 
slimy foot. 

As many of the marine shells appear in some degree amphi- 
bious, for instance, the Chitons and the Limpets, so, perhaps, 
some of the terrestrial ones may occasionally enter fresh 
waters ; indeed the amber shells,* at least one species," is stated 

1 Succinea. 2 S. dongata. 



I 



UNIVALVE MOLLUSC ANS. 157 

to sviriin occasionally on the surface of the water. From these 
circumstances it seems not improbable that the shell-fish, as 
well as the birds, so vast a proportion of them being marine 
animals, were all amongst the objects created on the fifth day, 
and produced by the waters. 

There are very large and beautiful shells found in South 
America, belonging to the terrestrial herbivorous section and 
to diflferent genera^ divided from Helix of Linne, but we know 
nothing of their history or habits, I shall therefore now say 
something upon the marine herbivorous Trachelipods. 

The violet snail,^ which, according to the account of its 
manners given by Bosc, who paid particular attention to them 
in a voyage from France to America, exhibits several very 
remarkable pecuharities. When the sea is calm, these ani- 
mals may be seen collected often in large bands, swimming 
over the surface by means of a floating apparatus consisting 
of aerial vesicles, produced by their foot ; and attached to its 
posterior part, a little below the point to which the operculum 
is fixed in other genera, and to which Cuvier thinks it bears 
some analogy,* who also observes that it has a natatory mem- 
brane or fin on each side of its body. During this action their 
head is very prominent, and the foot is so extended that the 
float or line of vesicles forms an angle with the middle of the 
shell. When the sea is rough, the animal absorbs the air from 
its vesicles, changes the direction of its foot, contracts its body, 
and lets itself sink. It does the same when in danger from 
any enemy, and further, like the cuttle-fish and some others, 
colours the water by the emission of a blue fluid, which serves 
to conceal it. They are vividly phosphoric in the night. 
Birds carry them off* with great dexterity. 

If their floating apparatus is mutilated the foot can reproduce 
it. The latter is flat towards the head, this part of it is fur- 
nished with a transparent membrane, which extends far be- 
yond its extremity, and is composed of a large number of vesi- 
cles of unequal size, those in the middle being the largest ; 
these vesicles the animals fill with air at their pleasure. The 
violet-coloured shell of this little animal is remarkably thin, 
which facilitates its excursions on the surface. It is singular 
that under this fragile vesicular float a little line of pearly 
fibres may be perceived, to which are attached its eggs ; in 
some species they are contained in little membranous bags or 
sacs. It is thought that the young animals, when liberated 

1 For instance, Achatvna Bulirrms, &c. 

2 laTUhitia, Plate VI. Fig. 2. 3 Plate VI. Fig. 2. a. 



158 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

from these bags or chambers, ascend their mother's float, and 
so are transported to the surface. Fishes are enabled to rise 
to the surface of the water by means of their air-bladders, and 
some radiaries by a vesicle which surmounts them,^ but nei- 
ther of them are more singular than these outriggers by which 
the vessel of the violet-snail is kept both buoyant and steady. 

The foot of the Molluscans, when we first observe it, seems 
to us merely an organ of locomotion, nothing remarkable in its 
structure, and incapable of any multifarious action, but when 
we study the history of this and the preceding snail, we see 
that it is a most important organ, and which performs a greater 
variety of operations than almost any organ of any other ani- 
mal. We have seen that it spins a fine silk and thread; that 
it secretes a fluid serviceable for several purposes ; that it can 
form a float, as in the present instance ; that it can be used as 
a hand in excavating and building, and various other manipu- 
lations, so that in giving them this instrument and endowing 
it with such variety of functions in the various tribes, their 
Creator gave them every thing they wanted. 

Perhaps the followers of Lamarck may say that, in the pre- 
sent instance, the animal constructs its own float itself, at the 
impulse of its own wants. But uninstructed by its Creator, 
how could it learn that vesicles full of air would serve to float 
its little boat, and if not already organized to answer the im- 
pulse of an exciting cause, in vain would the will of the ani- 
mal, if so instructed, endeavour to produce and inflate the vesi- 
cles, or, when it willed to sink, to empty them of air. 

The shell-fish of the aquatic tribe best known in this country 
is the periwinkle, vulgarly called the pin-patch,^ which, next to 
the oyster and the cockle, seems most in request as a relishing 
article of food. These animals, as I observed, not very long 
since at Cromer, in Norfolk, appear to make the bladder-kelp,^ 
which, at low water, may be seen there in large patches, a 
kind of submarine pasture, for I found them in abundance upon 
it at low water. As the Creator willed that the waters, whe- 
ther salt or fresh, should have tlieir peculiar inhabitants, it 
was requisite that each should have its appropriate food. Did 
all feed upon the same substance there would be a universal 
struggle, unless indeed, the entire variety of the submarine 
botanical world was done away, and one homogeneous article 
provided, in such quantity as to be a suflicient supply for all. 
But further, doubtless, diflerent organizations and forms could 
not be maintained upon the same pabulum, and therefore dif- 

1 See above, p. 104. 2 Titrho litorcus. 3 Funis vtsintJos^tis. 



UNIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 



159 



ferent creatures required different articles of food, or different 
parts of the same article. Here was a mutual office — the 
numberless vegetable productions require to be kept within 
due limits, and therefore the functions of the aquatic animals 
is to maintain them in due relative proportions. Was the 
ocean and all its streams planted as now, and there were no 
animals of any description to keep in check its vegetable pro- 
ductions, they \^uld all in time grow up and choke the rivers 
and gradually raise the bed of the ocean till there would be no 
more sea. 

Having considered the plant-devouring Trachelipods, I shall 
say something next upon the carnivorous or predaceous ones, 
which form the great body of large marine shells, and those 
which most ornament our cabinets, for to this tribe belong the 
Cowries,^ Cones,^ Mitres,^ Whelks,* Tuns,^Volutes,« Helmets,? 
Rock-shells,^ Strombs,^ and other conchs which exceed the 
general run of shells in beauty, form, and magnitude. But 
with regard to their habits and instincts we know little or 
nothing of any interest. 

They are distinguished from the herbivorous ones by breath- 
ing the sea^water, for they are all submarine, by means of a 
siphon or tube, instead of by an aperture in the neck; in the 
place of maxillce, their mouth is furnished with a retractile 
proboscis, with which they pierce and suck other shell-fish. 
The aperture of the shell is also very different, the siphon be- 
ing accompanied sometimes by a channel, and sometimes by 
a notch at the base of the aperture. 

The tribe most celebrated from ancient times, on account 
of the vaunted purple dye which one species produced, is that 
constituted by the Rock-shells, or Linne's great genus, Murex, 
and Lamarck's canaliferous Zoophagans, called so from the 
long straight canal which terminates the mouth of their shells. 
The principal feature of this tribe, besides their long channelled 
beak, is the vast variety of spines, and other processes and 
ridges, with which their Creator has armed a great number of 
ihem ; the beak and mouth of several give them no small re- 
semblance to the heads of certain birds, thus one is called the 
thorny woodcock,^'^ another the snipe," &c. 

At the first blush an inquirer into the use of these spines 



4 Buccinum. 
7 Cassis. 
10 M. Tribulus. 



2 Conus. 

5 Doiium. 

8 Murez. 

11 M. Haust^llum. 



3 Mitra. 
6 Valuta. 
9 Sirombus. 



160 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

and other arms of shell-fish, would imagine that their object is 
defence, yet when he is told that those which are most remark- 
able for them, are themselves predaceous animals; and that 
the herbivorous shell-fish are usually not distinguished by any 
thing of the kind, he seems to hesitate as to what conclusion 
he shall draw. It may be observed, however, that the tribe 
most distinguished for these arms, the rock-shells, are not so 
remarkable for their size as many others whfth live by prey, 
as the strombs, the helmet-shells, and the tritons, so that their 
armour may sometimes prevent one of these from boring their 
shells, and inserting its proboscis into them. 

The tribe we are now considering, the rock-shells, were in 
high esteem from the earliest ages on account of the dye that 
some of them afforded, and cloths dyed with it bore a higher 
price than almost any other: more than one species, however, 
yielded anciently a dye; one, according to Bochart, a glaucous 
or azure colour, as he interprets it, and the other purple. But 
Tyrian purple is no longer in request. I could say much, ob- 
serves the author just named, upon the finding, fishing, and 
methodof dying of the purpura, about the price, formerly enor- 
mous, nearly equalling that of pearls, a single shell, according 
to Aristotle, selling for a mina or about 3Z., concerning the time 
at which it began gradually to grow out of fashion, and at 
length to be wholly neglected : so that now it is never used, 
and no one knows the method of preparing it.. In fact, the 
cochineal seems to have supplanted it, but it would surely be 
an object of great interest to re-discover the Tyrian rock-shell, 
as well as that which yielded the azure colour, and ascertain 
how far they deserved, especially the former, the high enco- 
miums bestowed upon them, and to deck imperial shoulders. 
The shells are probably still in existence on the coast of Pales- 
tine. It was the custom to crush the shell as soon as taken, 
for if kept the animal was wont to vomit its flower, as the 
purple dye was called by Aristotle. This great philosopher 
thought the purpura lived six years, as the adult animal had 
six whirls in its shell, and he supposed one to be formed annu- 
ally. He gives a detailed history of these animals, of their 
congregating in the spring, and of their forming n kind of 
comb, like bees; he also mentions several kinds of them, that 
the small shells were bruised, and the aninial extracted from 
the large ones; that the dye lies between the neck and whai 
he denominates tlie poppy. It is found, by Cuvier, to be placed 
above the neck by the side of the stomach. Plumicr relates 
tliat a bhell-fibli of llii^ genus squills out its fluid in a si ream. 



UNIVALVE MOLLUSCANS. 161 

whenever molested, which renders it probable that its object is 
defence. 

Aristotle mentions the operculum of the purple, and also 
the proboscis, or tongue as he calls it, which he describes as 
longer than the finger, and protruded from under the opercu- 
lum, with this it feeds, and with it can pierce shells, and will 
attack even those of its own kind; this agrees with modern 
observations, adding that the tongue is terminated by a sucker 
armed with short tentacles. Aristotle also observes, an obser- 
vation confirmed likewise by modern investigators, that these 
animals bury themselves in the sand like the pectens. This 
learned naturalist also states that shell-fish at certain seasons 
hide themselves, snails in the winter, and the purples and 
whelks for a month during the dog days. 

The dye of the purple is mentioned in Scripture as well as 
that of the coccus, and was used as such in the time of Moses. 
It is said also to be used at this time in India and America to 
dye small pieces of stuflT, but in no place is it an important 
object. 

Having given so long an account of the rock-shells or pur- 
ples, I shall not have occasion to dilate upon any of the re- 
maining genera, but shall merely notice a few pecuharities 
that some of them exhibit. 

The Cowries are a tribe long known and admired for their beau- 
ty and polish, and one species^ forms the current coin in many 
parts of Africa, and many Asiatic Islands. Some remarkable 
facts distinguish their history ; from the form of their shell and 
of its aperture, its increment could not take place in the usual 
way, these animals, therefore, are furnished by their Creator 
with a remarkably ample mantle, the wings of which cover 
half the shell, and thus it is gradually thickened, and changes 
and variations in the colour take place that have puzzled 
conchologists to distinguish a species from a variet}^ At cer- 
tain times the animal is also stated to quit its shell, and form 
itself a new one more appropriate to its size, a circumstance 
related by Aristotle of the Buccinmn.^ 

Volutes are another polished tribe of shells, which are pro- 
bably formed by the mantle as in the Cowries — they are parti- 
cularly distinguished by having no operculum. The jet volute 
is viviparous, and its young when excluded are said to have 
shells an inch long. These probably are more exposed to 
enemies than the young of other shell-fish. They form an 
important article of food to some African nations. 



Cypraa Moneta. 2 Ktipu^, Arist. 

v 



162 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Before I close this account of these predaceous Molluscans, 
I must observe, that tliey have two distinct sexes, and conse- 
qiientl}^ male and female shells. The genuine hermaphrodites 
are confined to the bivalves, for in the univalve hermaphrodites 
two individuals are necessary for reproduction, and therefore 
those form a distinct link between the true hermaphrodites 
that impregnate themselves, and those that have distinct 
sexes. So gradual are the steps by which the Creator passes 
from low to hfgh. First, animals are reproduced without sex- 
ual intercourse, as in the polypes; then the two sexes are 
united in one body, and suffice for their own impregnation — 
next follow two sexes in the same body, which cannot impreg- 
nate themselves, bringing us at last two distinct sexes, or 
unisexual individuals. 

4. Lamarck's fifth family, the Heteropods, I introduce here 
because, being univalves, they appear to connect that tribe 
with the Cephalopods forming his fourth order, but which from 
the discovery of the animal of JsTautilus Pompilius, so admirably 
described by Mr Owen, being furfher removed from the other 
Molluscans, and the animal of the Heteropods having a pro- 
boscis and only two tentacles, seems intermediate between the 
Zoophagan Trachelipods and the Cephalopods. They have 
four swimming organs. There seems a considerable affinity 
between this tribe and the Pteropods in these organs, which 
indicates a circular arrangement in the univalve Molluscans. 
The Carinaria vitrea is one of the rarest shells that is known, 
arising probably from its extremely fragile conch, which is 
nearly as transparent as glass. A model of it in wax may be 
seen in the British Museum. The animal is a sailor like the 
Argonaut, to which it comes near. It is found in the South 
Seas. There are two other species known, one of w^iich fre- 
quents the Mediterranean. Some genera without shells are 
placed in this order by Lamarck. They swim horizontally 
like fishes, which circumstance, in conjunction with their fins 
or swimming organs, induced him to place them at the end of 
the Molluscans as near the fishes ; several authors consider 
them as belonging to the Pteropods, to which they are certainly 
related. 



CHAPTER X. 



Functions and Instincts. Cephalopods. 

We have now taken leave of what may be called the proper 
Molluscans, including the Bivalves, and Univalves^ of Aristo- 
tle and Linne, or the Conchifers and Molluscans of Lamarck, 
and are arrived at a Class remarkable, not only for their organ- 
ization, form and habits, but also for their position in the ani- 
mal kingdom ; for in their composition they seem to include 
elements from both the great divisions of that kingdom : from 
the Vertebrates— the beak, the eye, the tongue, an organ for 
hearing, the crop, the gizzard, and an analogue of the spine, 
with several other parts enumerated by Cuvier ; and from their 
own sub-kingdom, many of their remaining organs. We may 
descend to the very basis of the animal kingdom for the first 
draught of their nervous system, for it is discoverable in the 
wheel-animals in which Ehrenberg detected pharyngal gang- 
lions and a nuchal nervous collar f the sucker-bearing arms 
seem to have their first outhne in the fresh water polypes ;^ 
indeed if the mouth of the cuttle-fish with its suckers, be sepa- 
rated from the head, leaving behind the long arms, we see im- 
mediately an analogue of a radiary, particularly of a star-fish, 
with its rays bearing suckers below, and its central mouth. 
The lamellated tentacles observed by Mr Owen in his work, 
before quoted, on the animal of the Pearly Nautilus,* above 
and below the eyes, seem to lead to the antennae of Crusta- 
ceans and Insects, and numerous Molluscan characters are 
obvious to every one. From these circumstances it seems 
evident that the Creator has placed this tribe in a station which 
leads to very different and distant points in the animal king- 
dom, and that there is scarcely any but what may recognize 
ill it one or more of its own peculiar features — yet at the same 
time it exhibits many characters, both in its most extraordinary 
outward form and in its internal organization, that are quite 

1 AtQvpA. MoyoBvpct. 

2 Ganglia nervea pharyngea. Jinnulus nerveus nuchalis. Ehren. 

3 Hydra. 4 JVautilus PompiUns. 



164 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

peculiar and sui generis, of which no animal at present known 
exhibits the slightest traces. To mention only its muscular 
apparatus adapted to its unparalleled form ; its system of circu- 
lation, carried on in the first Order by three distinct organs 
instead of one heart; and the wonderful complication of their 
tentacles, of the nerves that move them, and the vascular 
system that animates them. 

This singular Class, which Cuvier denominated Cephalopods, 
or having their feet attached to their head, appears to follow 
very naturally the Trachelipods and Heteropods, lately des- 
cribed, which have not only eyes furnished with iris and pupil, 
but also distinct sexes, and are of predaceous habits, all char- 
acters which they possess in common with the Cephalopods or 
Cuttle-fish. There is, however, an animal amongst the naked 
Gastropods — called by the ancients, from its tentacles repre- 
senting the ears of a hare, the sea-hare,^ a name it still bears 
in Italy, which Linne named Laplysia, in which he was fol- 
lowed by Lamarck, but modern writers after Gmelin have called 
it Aplysia, a name used by Aristotle for a very different animal, 
a kind of sponge,^ and, therefore, improperly applied — this ani- 
mal has many characters that are found in some of the Cepha- 
lopods, particularly in its circulating and nervous systems; in 
having internal solid parts, and in discolouring the water with 
an inky fluid, so that there seems also a connection between 
this genus and the Cephalopods amounting to something more 
than a mere analogical resemblance. 

Mr Owen has divided this Class into two Orders, from the 
composition of their respiratory organs, namely, those that 
have two branchiae,^ or gills, and those that have four.* The 
first includes those that have no shell, and the second those 
that have one. The last is further divisible into those whose 
shell has many chambers, as the JsTautilus, and those where it 
has only one, as the Argonaut, or paper nautikis. 

To the first of these Orders belongs the cuttle-fish,^ one of 
the most wonderful works of the Creator. Its mouth is sur- 
rounded by eight long fleshy arms, or rather legs, somewhat 
conical in shape, and acute at the end, moved by innumerable 
nerves, furnished from numerous ganglions: these legs can 
bend in every direction with the utmost vigour and activi(^, 
their surface is furnished with many suckers, by which they 
can fix themselves strongly to any thing they wish to lay hold 

1 Lepus marinuSf Plin. 2 Hist. Jin. 1. v. c. 10. 

3 Dibranchiata. 4 Tetrabranchiata. r> Sepia. 



CEPHALOPODS. 165 

of, and by means of which, hke the star-fish,* they can move 
from place to place. When this animal walks, in this resem- 
bling also the star-fish and sea-urchin,^ it moves with its head 
and mouth downwards and its body elevated. It swims also 
and seizes its prey by means of these organs : besides these arms 
or legs, for they perform the functions of both, there is a pair 
of long organs, one on each side, having their origin between 
the first and second pair of legs, which are incrassated at the 
end, where, also, they are furnished with many suckers. Cu- 
vier supposes they use these as anchors to maintain them in 
their station during tempests, and as prehensile instruments, 
by which they can seize their prey at a distance. In the centre 
of the legs is the mouth, surrounded by a tubular membranous 
lip, including a beak, consisting of two mandibles, like that of 
a paroquet ; these mandibles or jaws are crooked, and the 
upper one fits into the lower as a sliding lid into a box. With 
these redoubtable jaws the cuttle-fish devours fishes, crusta- 
ceans and even shell-fish, which receive a further trituration 
in its muscular crop and its gizzard. By means of the suckers 
on their legs and arms, they lay such fast hold of their prey as 
to deprive them of all power of motion ; thus they master in- 
dividuals much larger than themselves. The hard and often 
spinose crust of crabs or lobsters cannot withstand the action of 
their trenchant jaws, aud they do not fear the gripe of their 
claws. Their large eyes, which resemble those of vertebrated 
animals, by their look of ferocity, are enough to create an alarm 
in the animals they pursue, and are said to see in the night as 
well as the day. So that although they are not like Pontoppi- 
dans Kraken — the notion of which is thought to have been 
taken from a large cuttle-fish — half a league in circumference, 
so as to be mistaken for floating islands, yet they are really as 
tremendous animals, their size considered, as any that Provi- 
dence has commissioned to keep within due limits the populace 
of the waters. 

One of their most remarkable and unique features, is the 
manner in which circulation takes place in them. They have 
three hearts; the principal one, seated in the middle, sends the 
blood through the arteries: the blood returns by a vena cava, 
which dividing into two branches, carries it to the two lateral 
hearts, each of which sends it to the gills for oxygenation, 
whence it returns again by the intermediate heart. 

The OctopuSy called by the French writers the Poiilpe, pro- 
bably a contraction of polype, differs from the common cuttle- 

1 See above, p. 108. 2 • Ibid. p. 114. 



166 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

fish, having neither the arms not* long tentacles of that animal, 
and instead of the large heavy bone has only two small carti- 
lages. This different structure is rendered necessary by the 
difference in their habits. The body of the octopus is small, 
and it has legs sometimes a foot and a half in length, vi'ith 
about tv^o hundred and forty suckers on each leg, arranged, 
except near the mouth, in a double series ; so that it walks with 
ease. They are often out of the water, and frequent rough 
places, are excellent swimmers, and move rapidly in the water 
with their head behind. The cuttle-fish, whose legs are short 
and body heavy, prefer the bottom, and do not attempt to 
swim, for which they are not well fitted. Providence has, 
therefore, given them their long arms to compensate for the 
shortness of their legs. 

A remarkable peculiarity distinguishes these animals. They 
are furnished with an organ which secretes a black fluid, with 
which they can produce an obscurity in the water that sur- 
rounds them, on any appearance of danger, or to conceal them- 
selves from their prey. The Chinese are said to use it in 
making the ink that bears the name of their country; some- 
thing similar, but not so black, is prepared from it in Italy; 
and Cuvier used it to colour the plates for his memoir on these 
animals. 

The second order of cephalopods, or at least the pearly nau- 
tilus, differs in several respects from those which constitute the 
first, and which I have just described, approaching much 
nearer to the Molluscans. The most striking approximation, 
and which first catches the eye of the examiner is its shell, 
which, though its spiral convolutions are not externally visible, 
exhibits a general resemblance to a univalve shell. To a per- 
son who had the opportunity of witnessing the motions of the 
animal that inhabits it, the first thing that would strike him, 
would be the means by which it progressed upon the bed of the 
sea, he would see no motion produced by the action of tenta- 
cular legs furnished with suckers, like those of the cuttle-fish, 
but instead of it, by a single expansive organ, exhibiting con- 
siderable resemblance to the foot of a snail. This organ, Mr. 
Owen, led by the nervous system, regards as surmounting the 
head and as its principal instrument for locomotion. The oral 
organs of this animal are much more numerous and compli- 
cated than those of the cuttle-fish, and are furnished with no 
suckers. Its tentacles are retractile within four processe^J, 
each pierced by twelve canals protruding an equal number ol 
these organ?, so that in all there are forty-eight. In fact, the 
%vhole oral a|)paraius, for the full description of wliich I must 



CEPHALOFODS. 



167 



refer the reader to Mr. Owen's excellent tract, except the man- 
dibles and tlie lip, is formed upon a plan different from that of 
the cuttle-fish, as likewise from that of the carnivorous trache- 
lipod Molluscans, and indicates very different modes of entrap- 
ping and catching their prey. 

The eye, also, Mr. Owen states to be reduced to the simplest 
condition that the organ of vision can assume, without depart- 
ing altogether from the type of the higher classes, so that it 
seems not far removed from that of the proper Molluscans. In 
this animal there is only a single heart, the branchial ones 
being wanting. 

There is one circumstance which proves this cephalopod to 
belong to this shell, and not to be a parasitic animal as that of 
the argonaut has been supposed to be — it is this, though the 
whole body appears to reside in the last and largest concame- 
ration of the shell, yet there is a small tubular tail-like process 
which enters the siphon, but which unfortunately was muti- 
lated, only a snjall piece being left, but enough to show that 
the animal had power over the whole shell by means of this 
organ, hence it follows that a Cephalopod is the animal that 
forms the shell of the nautilus, and its natural inhabitant, 
which goes a great way towards settling the controversy con- 
cerning the real animal of the argonaut, and amounts almost 
to a demonstration that the celebrated sailor that uses it as a 
boat, and scuds gaily in it over the ocean, is no pirate that has 
murdered its natural owner, but sails in a skiff of his own build- 
ing. 

The only circumstance that now leaves any doubt in the 
mind of the inquirer, is the very different nature of the cepha- 
lopod of the argonaut and the nautilus, the former appearing 
to be nearly related to the octopus or poulpe, and belonging to 
the genus Ocythoe of Rafinesque. In this genus the tentacu- 
lar legs or arms are similar to those of the poulpes, planted 
on the inner side with a double series of sessile suckers, the 
second pair having a membranous dilatation at their apex,* 
which the animal is supposed to use as a sail when it moves on 
the surface of the sea. Some naturalists deny that this ani- 
mal ever uses these organs for sailing or rowing, but Bosc ex- 
pressly asserts, and I am not aware that there is any reason to 
doubt his veracity, that he has seen hundreds of the argonauts 
rowing over the surface of the sea, in calm days, at so small a 
distance from the vessel in which he was saiUng, that though 
he could not catch one, he could observe all their manceuvres ; 

1 See Zool. Jo urn. n. xiii. t. iii. 



168 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

he further says, that they employ their dilated tentacle some- 
times as a sail and sometimes as an oar. 

When we consider how many instances are upon record of 
Molluscans being fitted with organs that enable them to catch 
the wind and sail on the surface of the sea,* there is nothing- 
contradictory either to analogy or probability that the argo- 
naut should do the same, especially when we consider how 
universally this idea has prevailed, from the time, at least, of 
Phny and Oppian, both of whom describe its sails with suf- 
ficient accuracy. Aristotle also speaks of his polype, which is 
evidently a cephalopod, as a sailor by nature — he says, thai 
when it rises from the deep it is in a subverted shell, rendering 
that action more easy and keeping the shell empty, but that 
when arrived at the surface it reverses it ; that it spreads its- 
sail to the wind, and when that blows, letting down its two 
cirri, one on each side, uses them to steer with. 

Upon comparing the animal of the nautilus with that of 
the argonaut, it appears evident, though the gills of the latter 
seem not to have been examined, that they belong to different 
Orders, at least, every probability rests on that side ; yet every 
thing speaks the relationship of the latter to the octopus, and 
therefore they would properly form a section of the dibranchiata 
of Mr Owen. In fact, the oral organs of the former are so 
widely different from those of the Order just mentioned, that one 
would almost expect another to connect them. This probably 
lies dormant amongst the fossil ammonites, the shells of many 
of which, though consisting of many chambers, are evidently 
intermediate between the nautilus and argonaut. 

We must next inquire what was the object of Him, who 
does nothing but with a view to some useful, though not al- 
ways evident, end, in producing these miniature monsters of 
the deep, so wonderfully organized and so unlike every other 
tribe of animals, in his creation, and yet containing in them, 
as we have seen, as it were, the elements, whether we ascend 
or descend, of all the rest. It appears from the united testi- 
mony of almost every writer that has noticed them, that they 
have it in charge to keep within due limits, a tribe of animals, 
almost equally destructive with themselves, and which are 
armed also with weapons of olfence, apparently equally terrific 
to their prey. It will be readily perceived that I an) speaking 
of the Crustaceans, and of the formidable pincers with which 
they seize their prey. It must be a curious spectacle to see one 
of the larger poulpes attack a lobster; at first sight, we should 

1 Sec above, p. 142. 



CEPHALOPODS. 169 

think the latter most Hkely to master his assailant, covered as 
he is with a hard crust, and using adroitly his powerful for- 
ceps, we should feel sure that the cuttle-fish, with his soft 
body and oral organs equally soft, stood no chance against 
such an antagonist. But He who gave him his commission, 
has fitted him for the execution of it, his soft tentacular or- 
gans will bend in every direction, and the numerous suckers 
wherewith they are planted, by pumping out the medium 
that forms the atmosphere of marine animals, produce such a 
pressure wherever they are fixed, that, struggle as it may, it 
cannot disengage itself from the grasp of its assailant; and, by 
their flexibility, these organs can imitate the fishermen, and 
tie together the two pieces of the forceps, so that it cannot 
bite ; thus, at last, it is brought within the action of the powerful 
beak of the cuttle-fish, which soon makes its way through its 
crust, and devours it shell and all. Even when at a distance, 
by means of its long arms, the cuttle-fish can lay hold of it 
and drag it towards it; and the poulpe, which has not these 
arms, makes up for it by having longer legs. 

The argonaut probably uses similar means to master its prey, 
and finds some defence in its shell, but the nautilus has a still 
stronger castle, which it may be supposed defies the bite of 
the Crustacean; its oral organs are calculated for closer com- 
bat, but the tentacles appear less adapted for holding fast their 
prey, not being visibly furnished with suckers, but what they 
want in power is made up in numbers, since in lieu of eight 
or ten tentacular organs, they have nearly a hundred. So 
diversified are the ways and instruments by which infinite wis- 
dom, POWER, and goodness enables its creatures to fulfil the 
ends for which he created them : and so an equilibrium is main- 
tained in every part of creation. 

The fossil species are mostly called by one name, AmmoniteSy 
as if they were the horns of the Egyptian Jupiter, and which, 
if any of them are now in existence, probably frequent the 
depths of ocean, and do not, like the argonaut or nautilus, 
visit its surface, to tell an admiring world, that God has created 
such wonderful beings. Specimens have been found of the 
enormous diameter of six feet. Though the sculpture of many 
of these great cephalopods gives reason to think that they 
may be intermediate between the argonaut and nautilus, yet 
the convolutions and external form of their conchs gives them 
no small resemblances to a genus of snails,* the species of 
which are often found in fresh waters, except that in this the 

1 Planorbis. 
W 



170 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

shell is more concave on one side than the other. The genus 
Spirula, the animal of which appears also to be a Cephalopod/ 
seems to exhibit the first tendency to this form. 

Amidst all this variety of Molluscous animals, exhibiting 
such diversity in their structure and organization, in their 
habits, food, modes of life, and stations, one great object seems 
attained by their creation especially, the production of calcare- 
ous matter. Even the shells of terrestrial testaceans, if we 
consider the vast numbers that every year perish, must add in 
no trifling degree to the quantity of that matter on the earth, 
and probably make up for the continual waste or employment 
of it, so as to maintain the necessary equihbrium ; but in the 
ocean, the quantity added to that produced by corallines, must 
be exceedingly great, even in lakes beds are formed of the 
deposits of the shell-fish inhabiting them, how much more 
gigantic must they be in the ocean, this will be evident from 
the superior number and size of the oceanic shells compared 
with the minute species, the Limnea, Planorbis, &c. that in- 
habit our lakes and pools. Thus, as reefs and islands are 
formed by the coral animals, the bed of the ocean may be 
elevated by the shells of dead testaceous ones. That eye which 
is never closed, that thought which is never intermitted, that 
power which never rests, but, engaged in incessant action, and 
employing infinite hosts of under-agents to effect his purposes, 
sees and provides for the wants of the whole creation : the plant 
absorbs from the soil, the animal after devouring the plant, or 
the plant-fed creature, returns to the earth what the plant had 
absorbed, and so maintains the proper equilibrium; He who 
numbers the hairs of our head, numbers the workmen that he 
employs, employing them only in such proportions so distri- 
buted, as may best accomplish His purposes. 

1 Plate VII. Fig. 2. 



CHAPTER XI. 

Functions and Instincts. Worms. 

We are now at length, after long wanderings, arrived, if I may 
so speak, at the limits of the Moll use an territory, and, having 
visited the capital, seem nov/ to be upon the confines of the 
higher hemisphere of the animal kingdom, the inhabitants of 
which are distinguished b}^ having their whole frame built upon 
a vertebral column, inclosing a medullary chord, and termi- 
nating, at its upper extremity, in a skull containing a developed 
brain. 

But though we seem arrived at the confines of this higher 
order of animals, there are still many, and some superior to the 
most perfect of the Molluscans, in the entirety of their nervous 
system, and the habits and instincts which they manifest, to 
which we have not yet paid the attention that they merit. 
These animals are particularly distinguished from the preceding 
Classes, by the appearance, or actual existence of segments or joints 
in their bodies, especially in their legs, of what may be called 
an annular structure. They are divided into two great tribes, 
which, from this circumstance, have been called Jlnnelidans, 
and Annulosans, and the last, with more propriety, Condylopes. 

There is one tribe, however, amongst the Radiaries, as we 
have seen, that shows some shght traces of insection, I allude to 
the star-fish and sea-urchins, forming the main body of La- 
marck's Order of Echinoderms. If we exan^ine the former, 
we find them marked out into areas, and in the latter, as I 
have before stated at large, the whole shell consists of nu- 
merous pieces united by different kinds of sutures. 

Before I call the reader's attention to the two tribes lately 
mentioned, exhibiting the appearance or reality of insection, I 
must notice an anomalous tribe of animals, whose real station 
has not been satisfactorily made out. I am speaking of the 
Entozoa or Intestinal Worms. This Class, as Mr W. S. Mac 
Leay has remarked, consists of animals differing widely in their 
organization, some having a regular nervous system formed 
by a medullary collar sending forth two threads, while others 
have no distinct organs of sense. 



172 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Lamarck places this Class between the Tunicaries and In- 
sects, and Cuvier, amongst his Zoophytes, between the Gelatines 
and Echinoderms. Mr Mac Leay has divided it into two classes, 
placing one, consisting of the Parenchymatous intestinal worms 
of Cuvier, between the Infusories and Polypes, and the Cavitaries 
of that author, amongst the Annulosans or Condylopes. Dr 
Von Baer is of opinion that these Entozoa, or worms, reducible 
to no common type of organization, inhabiting various animals 
in various parts of their body, together with the Infusories — 
and others might be added — should be banished from a natural 
arrangement of animals. He seems also to think, in which I 
feel disposed to agree with him, that the leading types of ani- 
mal organization are to be found in its lowest grades.* As I 
formerly observed with respect to the Infusories^ — these appear 
to be the basis on which God has built the animal kingdom. 
As some of the species appear connected with the Annelidans, I 
have introduced the Class here, but not as having formed any 
settled opinion as to its proper division and legitimate station. 

The majority of this Class are, what their name imparts, w- 
testinal worms, or parasites, that have their station within the 
body of other animals. Some of them, however, do not answer 
this description, as they are found only amongst aquatic vege- 
tables ; of this kind is a httle tribe, which Linne arranged with 
the leeches,^ to which they approach by the flukes.* The Plan- 
aria, in some respects, partakes more of the nature of a polype 
than of any other animal. Draparnaud, who paid particular 
attention to them, says that when young they have only two 
eyes, and acquire two more when adult. The head has no 
mouth; beyond the middle of the body, and on its under side, 
is a single orifice which serves for mouth, anus, and nostrils. 
This orifice answers to a long sac, which is the intestinal lube; 
from it sometimes issues a white tubublar organ, which he re- 
gards as respiratory ; this organ is doubtless the same with the 
retractile trumpet-shaped proboscis, issuing from a circular 
aperture in the middle of the abdomen, mentioned by Dr John- 
son in his interesting paper on these animals in the Philoso- 
phical Transactions, which he supposes to be a kind of mouth, 
when extended, equalling in length the animal itself/ This 
remarkable organ was also noticed by Miiller and Mr Dalyell. 
The circumstance of its receiving and extruding its alinient 
and respiring at the same orifice, is a clear approximation to the 

1 See Zool. Joum. July— October, 1828, 260. 2 See above, p. 80. 

3 Hirudo. i Fiusciola. Distoma. 

5 Philos. Trans. 1825. i. 254. t. xvi./. 10. 



WORMS. 173 

polype. A further confirmation of this is the power this ani- 
mal possesses of spontaneously dividing itself for the purpose 
of reproduction. M. Draparnaud — after remarking that the 
species he described, which he calls P. tentacidata, and which is 
probably synonymous with that particularly noticed by Dr 
Johnson under the name of P. cornutaf is oviparous in the 
spring and gemmiparous in the autumn — observes, that, in the 
latter season, it divides itself spontaneously and transversely 
into two parts above the abdominal orifice, and at the end of ten 
days each of these parts has acquired the head or the tail that 
it wanted. He has divided individuals into many transverse 
pieces and two longitudinal ones, and every piece, in due time, 
completed itself. It formed eyes, an intestinal tube, and other 
necessary organs. 

Mr Daly ell and Dr Johnson subsequently made similar ob- 
servations, and by dividing the head had succeeded in produc- 
ing an animal with two heads ; the latter, from the result 
of several observations, found that each individual, upon an 
average, might, by spontaneous self-division, produce ten, and 
this when under constraint ; if at liberiy, and in their na- 
tural situation, we may conjecture that their reproductive pow- 
ers might be carried much higher. Dr Johnson divided one 
into three equal portions, when the head speedily acquired a 
new body and tail ; the tail, a new body and head ; and the 
middle piece a new head and tail. 

From this whole statement it is evident that these pseudo- 
leeches, to say the least, their substance considered^ tend to- 
wards the polypes, and possess the same revivispent powers. 
In several characters, which I shall notice hereafter, they also 
agree with the Annelidans. Draparnaud, from the approxi- 
mation of the points on the head of P. cornutai to the tentacles 
oi lAjmnea^ thinks that they form a link between the Mollus- 
cans and the Worms. Reproductive powers have certainly 
been observed in the former, but only in the reproduction of 
mutilated organs, for a snail or slug cut in pieces, would not 
form so many individual animals. Bonnet has given an ac- 
count of reproductive powers in one of the Hispid Worms of 
Lamarck, supposed by Gmelin to be the J^ais barbata of Miiller, 
and in a species of fresh water worm belonging to the Anneli- 
dans, which, if I may so speak, grows from cuttings, and like 
the PlanaricB, can produce two heads. These last are proba- 
bly not far removed from the flukes,^ though their station is so 
different. Whether they Uve on animal or vegetable matter is 

1 Vers hispides. 2 Fasciola. 



174 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

not certainly ascertained ; to look at their proboscis it seems 
rather calculated to fix them as a sucker, to some animal, and 
so to derive their nutriment from it, like their analogue, the 
leech, especially as the marine species are supposed to be car- 
nivorous. 

Their wonderful reproductive powers appear to be given 
them by a kind Providence to prevent their total annihilation ; 
at least, it is stated, that at certain periods of the year, their 
numbers are so reduced, that where thousands were seen in 
summer, in spring scarcely one has survived. Their substance 
is so soft and gelatinous, that they are easily destroyed ; to 
compensate this, they are gifted with the extraordinary powers 
of reproduction above described. God hath so tempered his 
sentient works, that seeming defects, in one respect, are com- 
pensated by redundance in another. 

Having made these observations upon animals of this class, 
that do not infest man or beast internally, I next turn to those 
whose office is, in spite of all his care, to make the Lord of the 
Creation, as well as the whole animal kingdom, not only their 
constant abode, but also their food. More than ticenty of these 
pestiferous creatures, that attack man, have been enumera- 
ted; some penetrate into the very seat of thought ;^ others dis- 
turb his bile;^ others circulate with the blood in his veins ;^ 
others, again, are seated in his kidneys ;* others in his mus- 
cles ;^ the guinea worm^ in his cellular tissue : the ovaries of 
females are infested by another ;'' the tape-worms extend them- 
selves, joint by joint, to an enormous length in his intestines;^ 
some select the large intestine ;^ and others the small ones ;" 
some even attack infants, and them only." Such are the ills 
that flesh is heir to from these our internal assailants and de- 
vourers. — The recital is really enough to cause our hair to 
stand on end. No one can believe that all these instruments 
of punishment were at work in the first pair when they came 
from the hands of their Maker, and nothing, except death, can 
prove with a greater strength of evidence, that he is fallen from 
his original state of integrity and favour with God, than such 



1 Echinococcus Hominis. 2 Fasciola hepatica. 

3 Lingimiula Venarum. 4 Strongylus ffigo^- 

5 Ilydotiirera ccllulosa. 6 Filaria mcdinensis. 

7 Lingual ida jriuguicula. 

8 Tania solium, and Botryoccphalus Hominis. 

9 THchocephalus Hominis. 10 .^scarls lumbricoiJc^ 
11 Ozyurus Vcrmicularis. 



WORMS. 175 

an army of scourges set in array against liim. I shall enlarge 
a little upon a few of them, and then bid adieu to the disgusting 
subject. 

There are few people, that have not heard of the fluke, or 
animal resembling a flat fish, and which really has been mis- 
taken for one, often found in the liver of diseased sheep, and 
sometimes also in the human gall-bladder, and bile-vessels. 
The eyes of these animals are very prominent, and set in a 
cartilaginous ring, seeming to exhibit both iris and pupil; they 
are both planted in the upper side of the head, like those of 
the fish^ they resemble. Like the leech, the fluke has two 
orifices — the first in a tubular prolongation of the head, and 
the other underneath in the abdomen, but distant from the 
tail. By these they fix themselves, living by suction ; they 
sometimes produce fatal effects upon sheep. When only in 
small numbers, they, doubtless, as well as the rest of the Class, 
answer some good end; it is solely when they become too nu- 
merous that they occasion fatal diseases. Leeuwenhoek found 
870 in one liver, and in others only ten or twelve. He says 
they occur in many kinds of quadrupeds, as stags, wild boars, 
and calves. He seems quite at a loss to account for their in- 
troduction into the livers of these animals, but concludes that, 
like the leech, their native element is water, and their eggs, 
swallowed by cattle when they drink, so find their way into the 
liver. This of course is all conjecture. Providence, who as- 
signed to them their office, has also directed them to their sta- 
tion, but from whence or by what route we do not know cer- 
tainly at present. A friend of mine who has kept a flock for 
many years, has observed that whenever they were turned into 
moist meadows in wet seasons, they suffered greatly from these 
animals ; but that in the same situation, in a dry one, they 
were not aflfected. 

The most celebrated of all the intestinal animals, are the 
Tape-worms, of which five species have been ascertained to 
inhabit man, besides whom quadrupeds, birds, reptiles and 
fishes are equally their victims. These are now divided into 
two genera, the common^ and the grape-headed tape-worms.a 
The former is the most common in England,* but the latter^ 
seems the most gigantic of any. Sir A. Carlisle, who has a 
most excellent paper upon the former, in the second volume of 
the Linnean Transactions, says that he has met with them from 

1 Leeuwen : £rcan. Nat. E. Tr. t.f. H K. i. K. 

2 TcETiia. 3 Botryocephalus. Plate I. n. Fig. li. 
4 Toenia solium. 5 Botryocephalus latus. 



17G FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

less than six feet long and consisting only of fifty joints, to 
thirty feet long with four hundred joints. But these are noth- 
ing compared wilh others of the latter observed by continental 
writers. Bonnet mentions them as sometimes extending to 
the length of thirty ells, probably meaning French ells, or one 
hundred and twenty-five feet, and Boerhaave, one that greatly 
exceeded that length. 

These animals differ little from each other, but in the com- 
mon tape-worm, the head which has a circular orifice or mouth 
at its extremity surrounded by a number of rays of a fibrous 
texture, and probably serving to fix the mouth, has on each 
side two small suckers which doubtless attach the head more 
strongly. The mouth, before spoken of, is continued by a 
short duct into two canals, which pass round every joint of the 
animal's body conveying its ahment, and sending a transverse 
canal along its bottom which connects the two lateral ones. 
Sir Anthony injected upwards of three feet of these canals by a 
single push with a small syringe, but he could not make it pass 
upwards beyond two joints which seemed to indicate the ex- 
istence of valves opening only in one direction. He says there 
is no anal orifice, but other authors expressly mention one, and 
it is not easy to conceive, if the last has no orifice, how the 
joints can increase in number and remain concatenated. The 
body is composed of a vast number of joints, each having an 
organ whereby it attaches itself : those nearest the head are 
always small and they enlarge gradually as they recede from 
it. The extremity of the body terminates in a small semi- 
circular piece. 

Sir Anthony suspects that the several joints of the tape- 
worm are separate animals. This is an old opinion and has 
been adopted by several zoologists, but Bonnet seems to have 
proved, that however extended, the tape-worm is only a single 
animal. Whilst a living head remains attached to some joints, 
this creature maintains its station and keeps augmenting their 
number, but when any are broken off, they appear not to form 
new heads, as Sir Anthony supposes, but die and are expelled 
from the body. Their nutriment is probably derived from the 
gasiric, pancreatic, and other juices which perpetually flow 
into the stomach and intestines of the animals they infest ; 
and they employ the tentacular rays as a mean of irritation to 
determine a greater secretion of these fluids. 

It would be an endless labour to expatiate in this vast field 
where the rest of the animal kingdom is concerned, amidst 
tliereforc fhc various and strange forms that are destined to 
this office, I shall select only a few, beginning with one that 



WORMS. 177 

affects one of the most valuable of our animal possessions, I 
mean the Hydatids^^ which particularly and often fatally affect 
our Hocks of sheep, not indeed that tiiey are confined to them, 
for they are found also in swine, deer, and oxen, and even in 
man himself. 

These animals resemble the tape-worm in their oral organs, 
but their body, especially posteriorly, is vesicular. The lym- 
phatic vesicles are what medical men call hydatids ; they are 
found usually in the brain and in the liver of these animals. 
Their size varies according to the species, some are as big as 
the fist, and one was shown to the School of Medici rje in Paris 
as big a man's head. Their shape varies, but generally is 
somewhat spheroidal, their substance is composed of mem- 
branes one on another more or less thick, and formed of circu- 
lar fibres visible only under a lens ; they are half-fiiled with 
transparent lymph. They exhibit a peristaltic motion which 
is often very lively. 

Three species more particularly annoy our slieep. The 
cerebral hydatid,^ which finds its way into the brain of these 
poor animals and occasions the vertigo ; and the vervecine^ 
and ovine hydatids,* which penetrate into their lungs and liver 
and occasion the rot. It is usually discovered when a sheep 
is infested by the former of these pests by its turning often and 
briskly its head on one side; when it runs very quick, and 
suddenly stops without any apparent cause; in a word, when 
it appears almost deranged. Though the progress of the 
disease they produce is slow, it is generally fatal. Five hun- 
dred have been counted in the head of a single sheep. The 
ravages, however, produced by this hydatid are nothing to 
those occasioned by the other two, which attack the lungs and 
liver and cause the rot, by which, in some years, thousands 
perish. 

Some worms are remarkable for their very singular forms or 
station. One that attaches itself to the gills of the bream, 
looks like a double animal,'^ and a kind of fluke, ^ in great num- 
bers infests the ball of the eyes of the perch.'' 

Though at first view the animals of which I have in the 
present chapter given some account seem to be altogether 
punitive, and intended as scourges of sinful man both in his 
own person and in his property, and their great object is hasten- 

1 Hydatis. 2 H. cerchralis. 

3 H. vervecina. 4 H. ovilla. 

5 Diplozoon paradoxum. Plate 1. b. Fig. 4. 

6 Diplostomum volvcns. Ibid. Fig. 5. 7 Ibid. Fig. 6. 

X 



178 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

ing the execution of the sublapsarian sentence of death, yet 
this evil is not unmixed with good. Though fearful and hurt- 
ful to individuals, yet it promotes the general welfare by help- 
ing to reduce within due limits the numbers of man and beast. 
Besides, with regard to the Lord of the Creation, these things 
are trials that exercise his patience and other virtues, or tend 
to produce his reformation, and finally to secure to him an 
entrance into an immutable and eternal state of felicity, when 
that of probation is at an end, so that the gates of Death may 
be to him the gates of peace and rest. 



CHAPTER XII. 

Functions and Instincts. Jlnnelidans. 

The animals we have just been considering form an almost 
insulated group, so that it seems not easy to say to what tribe 
they are most nearly related, but the soft Pseudo-leeches, as 
was observed above, especially those that have rudimental ten- 
tacles, seem to tend somewhat towards the molluscan tribes; 
they exhibit considerable resemblance to the blood-suckers or 
true leeches, and hke them have an instrument of suction, 
though employed, perhaps, in extracting the sap or the blood 
of plants, and at the same time, in many respects, as we have 
lately seen, they approach the polypes. 

The Flukes, likewise, appear to have some characters in 
common with the leech,* so that a passage is open from the 
intestinal worms towards the Annelidans, some of w^iich, as the 
earth-woim, occasionally become intestinal, and several are 
possessed of reproductive powers almost as great as those of 
the pseudo-leech, or the polype. I shall therefore next, in 
taking my departure from the worms, bend my steps to the 
animals just mentioned, which formerly bore the same general 
denomination. 

They are called Annehdans, I suppose, because they appear 
to be divided into little rings, or else to have annular folds, and 
are soft vermiform animals, some naked, others inhabiting 
tubes, in some simply membranous, in others covered with 
agglutinated particles of sand, and in others formed, like those 
of the MoUuscans, of shelly matter. Some have neither 
head, eyes, nor antennae, while others are gifted with all these 
organs; instead of jdinted legs, their locomotions are accom- 
plished by means of fleshy bristle-bearing retractile protuber- 
ances or spurious legs disposed in lateral rows. Their mouth 
is terminal but not formed on one type ; in some it is simple, 
orbicular or labiated ; in others it consists of a proboscis often 
having maxillae. They have a knotty spinal marrow, in this 
being superior to the MoUuscans and approaching the Condy- 

l See above, p. 175. 



180 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

lopes. They have red blood, and their circulation is by arte- 
ries and veins, but they have no special organ for the main- 
tenance of the systole and diastole, their Creator not having 
given them a heart, but where the veins and the arteries meet, 
there is an enlargement, and the systole and diastole is more 
visible, as Cuvier remarks, than in the rest of the system, these 
enlargements therefore seem to represent a heart. 

Savigny, in the third part of his Systeme des Jlnimaux sans 
Vertebres divides them into five Orders, of which he gives only 
the characters of the four first, intending to publish, in a sup- 
plement, his account of the fifih; these Orders he arranges in 
two Divisions — the first including those that have bristles for 
locomotion, and the second those that have them not. 

1. His first Order he denominates J^ereideans,^ and charac- 
terizes them as having legs provided with retractile subulate 
bristles, without claws; a distinct head with eyes and antennae; 
a proboscis that can be protruded, generally armed with 
maxillae. 

2. The second he names Serpuleans, these add to the legs of 
the former retractile bristles, wif/i claws; they have no head 
furnished with eyes and antennae, and no proboscis.^ 

3. The third he names Lumbricinans ; these have no project- 
ing legs; but are furnished wirh bristles seldom retractile ; they 
have no head with eyes and antennae, and no maxillte. 

4. His fourth Order he names Hirudineans. They have a 
prehensile cavity, or sucker, at each extremity, and eyes.^ 

5. In his fifth Order he intends to comprehend those Anne- 
lidans that have neither bristles nor prehensile cavities, but his 
account of this has not been published. 

He begins with the most perfect of the Annelidans, but 
viewing them in connection with the worms I must reverse the 
order, and instead of descending ascend, which will bring me 
ultimately into connection with the more distinctly jointed ani- 
mals the Condylopes. 

1. The Order of Hfrudineans includes animals that are of 
the first importance, as well as some that are fearfully annoying, 
to mankind. The common leech* has long been so much in 
request with medical men, on account of the facility with 
which it can be applied to any part of the body where bleeding 
is required, tliat they are now become scarce in our own waters, 
and consc(juently dear, so that large numbers are imported from 
the Continent. 

1 Nrrddc(t. 2 Scrpulrcc. 3 Liimbricimr mul lJiriiiliur(r 

4 llirvdo medicinalis, h. {Sanguistiga. Sav.) 



ANNELIDANS. 181 

Providence has gifted these animals with a sucker on the 
underside at each extremity of their body, by which their loco- 
motions are performed, and by means of the anterior one they 
fix themselves to any animal that comes in their way. We see 
therefore in them, though on a larger scale, some approxima- 
tion to the locomotive and prehensile organs of some of the 
Cephalopods, and prior to them, of the Stelleridans and Echin- 
idans,^ which likewise move and fix themselves by suckers. 
The mouth is situated in the cavity of the oral sucker, it is tri- 
angular and armed with three sharp teeth disposed longitudi- 
nally in a triangle, two being lateral and one intermediate, 
and higher up. These teeth are sharp enough to pierce not 
only the human skin, but even the hide of an ox, and have 
their edge armed with two rows of very minute teeth; at the 
bottom of the mouth is the organ of suction which imbibes the 
blood flowing from the wound made by the teeth. These 
animals inhabit fresh waters, in which they swim like eels 
with a vermicular motion. In moving on a solid body, they 
first fix themselves by their anal sucker, which is larger than 
the oral, and then by means of their annular structure, extend 
themselves forwards, when they fix their mouth, detach their 
anal sucker, and thus fixing themselves alternately by each 
proceed with considerable rapidity. They are hermaphrodites, 
and bring forth their young alive. When in their native wa- 
ters they suck any animal that comes in their way, even those 
with white blood, as the larvae of insects, worms, and the like. 

Herodotus relates that the crocodile, in consequence of its 
frequenting the water so much, has the inside of its mouth in- 
fested by leeches, which a httle bird, named the trochilus, en- 
ters and devours, without receiving any injury from the mon- 
ster. Geoffroy St Hilaire asserts that no leeches are found in 
the Nile, and therefote supposes the Bdellcz of the father of 
history were not leeches but mosquitoes. But Savigny has 
described a leech under the name of Bdella nilotica^ which he 
regards as synonymous with the leech of Herodotus. Bosc 
mentions one' which was found in the stagnant waters in Egypt, 
when not inflated as small as a horse hair, which very much 
annoyed the French soldiers, attacking them in nearly the same 
way ; when they drank, fastening itself to their throat, and oc- 
casioning hemorrhages and other serious accidents. 

Mr Madox, in his Excursions in the Holy Land, Egypt, &c., 
states that he had frequently seen, on the banks of the Nile, a 
bird about the size of a dove, or rather larger, of handsome 

1 See above, p. T64, 108, HO. 2 Plate VIII. Fjg. 3 



182 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

plumage, and making a twittering noise when on the wing. 
It had a pecuHar motion of the head, as if nodding to some 
one neau it, at the same time turning itself to the right and 
left, and making its conge twice or thrice before its departure. 
This bird, he was told, was called Sucksaque^ and that tradi- 
tion had assigned to it the habit of entering the mouth of the 
crocodile, when basking in the sun, on a sand bank, for the 
purpose of picking what might be adhering to its teeth : which 
being done, upon a hint from the bird, the reptile opens his 
mouth and permits it to fly away.^ 

This seems evidently the Trochihis of Herodotus, above al- 
luded to, as clearing the mouth of the crocodile from the 
leeches. Aristotle, in more than one place of his History of 
Animals, mentions such a bird, and a similar tradition concern- 
ing it, with that of Mr Madox. "The Trochilus flying into 
the yawning mouth of the crocodile cleanses his teeth, and thus 
is provided with food. The latter, sensible- of the benefit, suf- 
fers it to depart uninjured. "^ In another place,^ he seems to 
speak of it as an aquatic bird, yet afterwards he describes it as 
frequenting shrubberies and subterranean places.* Whether 
this animal really attends thus upon the crocodile has not been 
ascertained, but it would be singular that such a tradition 
should have maintained its ground so long without any foun- 
dation. 

As a further proof that the Bdella of the father of history is 
a true leech, and not a mosquito, — as M. Geoff'roy St Hilaire, 
from the meaning of its primitive,^ would interpret the word, — 
it may be observed that Aristotle compares the Bdella to an 
earth-worm,^ and describes its peculiar motion ; and in Hesy- 
chius it is said to be a kind of Scolex or worm; Theocritus also 
alludes to its blood-sucking propensities.^ 

That leeches infest the aquatic Saurians is further evident 
from a letter received by Mr R. Taylor, and very kindly com- 
municated by him to me, from a friend at Calcutta, Mr W. 
C. Hurry, who having observed that the fauces of the gigantic 
crane^ were generally very full of leeches, determined to ex- 
amine the crocodile; and upon a large alligator he found a 
small red species, of which he sent specimens. A friend of 
mine, Mr Martin, of Islington, observed also that the alligators 



1 Excursions, &c. i. 408. 2 Hist. Au. 1. ix. c. G. 

3 Ibid. 1. viii. c. 3. 4 Ibid 1. ix. c. 11. 

5 Them. BcTix^a, to suck. 6 Dc inccssu animal, c. 0. 

7 Idyll, ii. line ^^'[y, he calls it At/mVArtf B«r»\\*. 

8 Ciconia Jlrgala ? 



ANNELIDANS, 183 

of Pulo Penang were infested, as he thought, by an animal of 
this kind, called by the natives its louse. 

The Trocliilus of Aristotle, Mr Stanley states to Mr Taylor, 
is the Egyptian Plover ;i who further observes that the Green 
Tody* is also related to cleanse the mouths of the alligators in 
the West Indies, from the gnats and flies that stick, in great 
abundance, in the glutinous matter they contain. 

But there is a terrestrial kind of leech found in the island of 
Ceylon, which appears to be a greater pest than any other 
species of the genus, and one of the greatest scourges of that 
fine island. They infest, in immense numbers, the mountains, 
woods, and swampy grounds, particularly in the rainy season. 
They are oftener seen on leaves and stones than in the waters. 
The largest are about half an inch long when at rest. Their 
colour varies from brown to light brown, with three longitudi- 
nal yellow lines. They are semi-transparent, and when fully 
extended are like a fine chord, sharp at the extremity, and 
easily thread any aperture, so that they can penetrate through 
the light clothing worn in that climate, rendering it impossible, 
at that season, to pass through the woods without being covered 
with blood, Dr Davy counted fifty on the same person ; no 
sooner does any individual stop, than, as if they saw or scented 
him, they crowd towards him from all quarters. From their 
immense numbers, activity, and thirst of blood, they are the 
great pest of travellers in the interior. Percival says that the 
Dutch, in their march into the interior, at different times, lost 
several of their men from their attack. Other animals besides 
man suffer dreadfully from them, and horses in particular are 
rendered so restive, when they fasten upon them, as to be quite 
unmanageable and unsafe to ride. The only way to prevent 
their attack, is to cover the skin completely. 

The ofl[ice devolved upon the present tribe, is one which, 
within certain limits, is beneficial to the animals who are the 
objects of it— though those last mentioned would be inserted 
in a list of the destroyers of the animal kingdom — which 
contribute to maintain a just balance between the different 
members of it. The fly that bites the horse prevents it from 
overfeeding, and so the leeches may be of use to the larger 
aquatic animals, at the same time that the smaller ones, such 
as the grubs of insects, must generally perish from the inser- 
tion of their sharp jaws, and the suction of their proboscis. 

Yet, as we see, this is one of the animals that man has taken 
into alliance with him, and this no doubt Providence intended 

1 Charadrius Mgyptius. 2 Todus viridis. 



184 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

he should, and probably directed him to it, I mean by causing 
certain circumstances to take place that attracted his atten- 
tion and indicated its probable use. So that what at first put 
him to pain, and caused him alarm, he found, upon trial, might 
be rendered a very valuable addition to his means of cure when 
attacked by disease, or when he was suffering from a local 
injury. 

The leech tribe, besides its utility in the exercise of its own 
function, may be useful as affording nutriment to some other 
animals, as fishes and birds. 

The earth-worms'^ form a principal feature of the next Order, 
and afford a delicious morsel to birds of every wing. The 
fisherman also baits his hook with them, and the ground-bee- 
tles* often make a meal of them, so tiiat had they no other 
use, still they would be a very important part of the creation. 
But their great function appears to.be that of boring the earth 
in all directions, w^iereby they are useful to the farmer and 
grazier, giving a kind of under-tillage to pasture and other 
lands, and by the casts which they every where throw up, 
they help to manure the soil, and do the same for pastures, that 
the spade does for the garden and the plough for arable land, 
place the soil that laid below above. Their food being vege- 
table detritus, what passes from them must be very good ma- 
nure. 

The anatomy of these well-known animals is very singular 
and well worthy the attention of the physiologist and zooto- 
mist, the only circumstance relating to it that I shall here 
mention is that their long body is not only divided externally 
into rings, but internally into an equal number of cells sepa- 
rated from each other, if I may so speak, by a kind of dissepi- 
ment or diaphragm — there are more than a hundred of these 
cells in the common species, as appears by Mr Bauer's admi- 
rable figures in the Philosophical Transactions for 1823, to which 
. I must refer the reader for further information on this subject, 
first observing that there seems some analogy between tb.e 
cells of the earth-worm and the joints of the tape-worm. 

The motion of these animals, and of many other Annelidans, 
is accomplished by means of the rings of their body and their 
lateral bristles ; the latter the Creator has given to them, in 
the place of legs : pushing with the anterior portion of these 
against the plane of position, by contracting the rings, they 
bring up the posterior portion of their body, and then fixing 

1 Lumbricus (Entcrion Sav.) tcrrcstris, L. &c. 2 Carabus. L- 



ANNELIDANS. 185 

that part, extend the anterior rings, and so proceed successively 
with a kind of undulating motion. 

3. We are next to notice a tribe of Annelidans, many of 
which, in one respect, make some approach to the Testaceous 
Molluscans. Though truly annulated and furnished with a 
kind of false legs, they are defended by a shell resembling in 
its substance, that of the class just alluded to, but often by its 
irregular convolutions proving that it belongs to an Annelidan 
and not to a Molluscan; some indeed approach to the spiral 
convolutions of a Trachelipod shell; others form a membra- 
nous sac, and cover it with agglutinated particles of sand, as 
the common Sahella; others again, likewise inhabit a tube, 
but they fix it in the rocks. The testaceous animals of this 
class, particularly the worm-shells* inhabit a tortuous tube 
which they form, probably with more ease and celerity than 
the Molluscans form their shells — for they appear almost to do 
this as they move, since the shape of the shell imitates the 
sinuous windings of a worm, and that of the Serpula adheres 
to the substances on which it is formed. We see it often upon 
the shells of bivalves, to which it adheres by the lower surface, 
looking like a little worm creeping upon them f and forming 
convolutions ; I have a specimen on a valve of the cock's-crest 
oyster,^ which is bound down by a process issuing apparently 
from the disk of the oyster-shell itself, how produced and 
thrown over the Serpula it seems not easy to conjecture. Dif- 
ferent species of these worm-shells are often found, embracing 
each other with their convolutioj^s, on the same shell ; where- 
ever the sea is or has been, they abound either in a recent or 
fossil state ; they are found on rocks, and sea-weed as well as 
on marine shells, and those of lobsters. The Serpulidans, in 
general, imitate the spiral structure of the Trachelipod and 
other Molluscans, as is particularly evident in Siliquaria and 
Vermetus, if indeed the last genus is not itself a Molluscan, as 
Lamarck makes it. 

Other speciesof this Order are taught to establish themselves 
in fissures of rocks, which serve them instead of a shell to pro- 
tect the membranous tubes into which they retract their petal- 
iform tentacles, which together represent a beautiful radiated 

1 ScrpulidcB. 2 S. Triguetra. 

3 Ostrea Crista-galli. Since the above was written, in the collection of 
the late Peter Collinson, I have seen two specimens of this oyster, which had 
produced from the back of their shell a double seriesof processes, with which, 
as with so many fingers, they had taken firm hold of a piece of stick. 
Y 



186 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

blossom, or tlie neciarium of a passion-flower. Of this kind is 
the Magnificent Amphitrite, figured m the Linnean Transactions^ 
It is found in the rocks of various parts of the coast of Jamaica. 
When alarmed, it retracts its tentacles within its tube, and the 
tube itself into the rock. How it excavates its rocky burrow 
has laot-b^en ascertained. 

The Sabellm, which pass under various names in different 
authors, inhabit the sandy parts of the shore, and like certain 
case-worms form a covering for their tube of selected grains of 
sand, mixing sometimes other substances that suit their pur- 
pose, which, by some secretion at their disposal, they glue pretty 
firmly together so as to form a neat case tapering towards the 
tail. The animal buries itself and case in the sand, with its 
head towards the surface, so, probably, as to enable it to pro- 
trude it and expand its tentacles to collect its food when covered 
by the water. The bristles of the legs in some species resem- 
ble burnished gold. 

The functions of a large proportion of the animals of this 
order seem to correspond with those of the bivalve shell-fish ; 
they undermine the sands and the rocks, bore into sponges 
and corallines^ and other submarine substances, and some pro- 
bably, into submerged wood: like them, also, they seem to feed 
on animalcules brought within their reach by the tide. The 
Serpulidans, wdiose food is similar, are directed by the will of 
their Creator to affix themselves externally to any submerged 
bodies that come in their way, whether mineral or animal. All 
they require seems to be something to attach themselves to, on 
which they can protrude their tentacular gills, and seize their 
prey. They must contribute largely, as well as the mining 
Annelidans of this order, to the production of calcareous matter. 
Mr Sowerly suspects that their proboscis may be instrumental 
in forming the shell, but it seems not properly a proboscis, hut 
merely an operculum on a long footstalk, which was requisite 
that it might be protruded so far as not to interfere with the 
action of the gills. 

The animals included in Mr Savigny's first Order, the 
JSTereideans bring us very near to the Condyloj)es. They have 
a distinct head, jointed organs like antennae, eyes, a proboscis 
armed with maxilla), and spurious legs. They have also cer- 
tain dorsal scales, which M. Savigny calls elytra, and deems 
analogous (o the organs of flight in insects. These animals 
seem to afford the first example of the conversion of organs of 

I Tuhulnria mnenifica. Shnw. 



ANNELIDANS. 187 

locomotion into others, employed for a different purpose. I do 
not mean bj^ this, that, in the progress of the animal's growth, 
one organ is really converted into another, but that analogous 
organs, in different tribes or genera, are employed for different 
purposes. Thus, what in most Annelidans are locomotive or- 
gans, in Lycoris, Phyllodoce, and some other Nereideans^ become 
a kind of tentacle. The marine Scolopendra of Aristotle most 
probably belonged to this Order, and many species make a near 
approach to ihe terrestrial ones.*^ Like them they are long and 
often flat, consisting of agreat number of segments, some having 
between two and three hundred, furnished according to the spe- 
cies, with one, two, or three pairs of legs in each ; like them also 
they twist about in all directions when handled, they conceal 
themselves in close places where they lie in wait for their prey. 
In one respect some of them add the instinct of the spider to 
that of the centipede, for they hne and sometimes cover the 
cavities of the rocks which they inhabit with a slight silken 
web, and thus concealed they watch the approach of some 
animal, and, suddenly thrusting out the anterior part of their 
body, seize and devour it. 

My late indefatigable and talented friend, the Rev. L. Guild- 
ing once found a land species, in an ancient wood in the Island 
of St. Vincent's which from its soft body he regarded as a Mol- 
luscan, but from its figure, and annulose structure, its jointed 
antennae, and seemingly jointed legs crowned with bristles, it^ 
certainly belongs, as Mr Gray has remarked, to the present 
class. Though it has scarcely a distinct head, its resemblance 
to the cylindrical myriapods* is very striking. Other species 
of this Order resemble the Isopod Crustaceans, and some even 
roll themselves up like one tribe of them.^ 

These animals have their haunts sometimes in deep burrows 
and passages under ihe sea-weed or in the sea-sand. They 
are so fierce in their habits that some have been styled the 
tigers of the worms. Some fishes in their turn make them 
their prey. Many of them, as the sea-mouse,'^ are remarkable 
for the brilliancy of their metallic hues. Perhaps these daz- 
zling splendours, as in the case of some insects^ may be of use 
to them in preventing the escape of their prey. Their forms 
and instruments of locomotion seem particularly adapted to 
the situation and circumstances in which they are placed ; their 

1 Savigny, Syst. des Annd. 9, 12, 13. 2 Plate VIII. Fig. 4. 

3 Plate VIII. Fig. 1. Mr G. calls it Peripatus juliformis. 

4 Julus. L. 5 JVereis Armadillo. 

6 Aphrodita aculeata. 7 Introd. to Ent. ii. 221. 



188 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

legs, which approach the jointed legs of crustaceans and in- 
sects, fit thenri for moving on the surface of the bed of the sea, 
their oars for swimming in the water, and the long form of 
many for threading the sinuous paths and burrows in which 
they have their habitation and place of refuge. So exactly are 
they fitted by the skilful hand of the almighty and benevolent 
Architect of all animal forms to live and move in the place he 
has assigned to them. 



CHAPTER XIII. 



Functions and Instincts. Cirripedes and Crinoideans, 

CIRRIPEDES. 

There is a class of animals defended by multivalve shells, 
separated from the MoUuscans not only by the more complex 
structm-e of their shells, but also by very material differences 
in the organization of the creatures that inhabit them. These 
Linne considered as forming- a single genus, which he named 
Lepas, a word derived from the Greek lexicographers, and 
explained by Hesychius as meaning a kind of shell-fish that 
adheres to the rocks. In this country these animals are known 
by the general name of Barnacles. Lamarck, I believe, was 
the first who regarded them as entitled to the rank of a class, 
which he denominated Cirrhipeda^ not conscious, that by the 
insertion of the aspirate, he made his term, like MonoculuSy 
half Greek and half Latin: later writers who have adopted 
the class, to avoid this barbarism, have changed the term to 
Cirrhopoda, but as this gives a different meaning to the word, 
changing fringed or teridril-legs,^ very happily expressing the 
most striking character of the animals intended, into yellow-legs,^ 
which does not indicate any prominent feature, I shall, after 
Dr Leach and Mr W. S. Mac Leay, omitting the aspirate, call 
them Cirripeda, or Cirripedes. 

These animals have a soft body, protected by a multivalve 
shell. They are without eyes, or any distinct head ; have no 
powers of locomotion, but are fixed to various substances. 
Their body, which has no articulations, is enveloped in a kind 
of mantle, and has numerous tentacular arms, consisting of 
many joints, fringed on each side, and issuing by pairs from 
jointed pedicles : their mouth is armed with transverse toothed 
jaws in pairs, which, hke the mandibles of the Crustaceans, 
are furnished with a feeler ; they have a knotty longitudinal 
spinal chord ; gills for respiration ; and for circulation, a heart 
and vascular system. 

1 Lat. Cirri. 2 Gr Kip^ic 



190 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

This class is divided into two Orders. 

1. The first consists of the Lepadites, or Goose-barnacles,* 
the species of which are distinguished b}^ a tendinous, contrac- 
tile, and often long tube, fixed by its base to some solid marine 
substance, supporting a compressed shell, consisting of valves 
vniited to each other by membrane, and by having six pairs of 
tentacular arras. They are usually found in places exposed to 
the liuctuations of the waves. One genus*^ appears to perfo- 
rate rocks to form a habitation. These animals roll up and 
unroll their arms with great velocity, thus creating a Uttle 
whirlpool, that brings to their mouth an abundant supply of 
animalcules, an action which Poll compares to fishermen 
casting a net. Some species, instead of shell, are covered by 
a membranous sac, having occasionally very minute shelly 
valves. ^ 

2. The second Order of Cirripedes consists of the Balanites, or 
Acorn-barnacles, which are distinguished from the Lepadites 
by a shelly, instead of a tendinous tube, the mouth of which is 
closed by an operculum, usually consisting of four valves. The 
animals of this Order are commonly regarded as sessile; but, if 
Lamarck is right in considering the valves of the shell of the 
Lepadites as analogous to the operculum of the Balanites, as it 
seems to be, and their tendinous tube as really a part of the 
body of the animal — as its being organized, living, and muscu- 
lar, seems to prove — then it must be analogous to the shelly 
lube of the latter, and both must be considered as elevated by 
a footstalk. This tube, in the Balanites, consists usually of six 
pieces, soldered, as it were, together ; and in several species, as 
in the common sea-acorn,* of a triangular shape, and having 
their acute angle alternately at the base and at the mouth of 
the tube. The base of the tube generally takes the form of 
the bodies upon which it is fixed, and is sometimes composed 
of shell, sometimes of membrane, and sometimes it is incom- 
plete. The animal, in this Order, has twenty-four tentacular 
arms, shorter than those of the Lepadites, consisting of two 
sorts, namely, six pairs of large similar ones, but unequal in 
size, placed above ; and as many smaller pairs, dissimilar and 
unequal, and placed below. One pair of these is much larger 
than the others. In the water they keep these tentacles* in 
perpetual motion, and thus arrest, or, by producing a current 

1 Anatifa. Pcntclasmis, &c. 2 Lithotrya. 

3 Anatifa corlacca ct Icporina. 4 Bnlanus TintinnahuJum. 

5 These organs, though called tentacles, from their use, seem ratlier ana- 
logouR to the arUenna and other jointed organs of Condylopes. 



CIRRIPEDES. 191 

to their mouth, ahsoib the aniiimlcules, which constitute their 
food. They not only fix themselves upon inanimate substances, 
such as rocks, stones, the hulls of ships, &c. but also upon va- 
rious marine animals and plants. Thus some are found on 
Zoophytes, as sponges and madrepores ; others attached closely 
to each other on shell-fish, especially bivalves, so closely thai 
the point of a pin cannot be thrust between them. One spe- 
cies takes its station on the shell of the turtle ;^ others plant 
themselves in the fiesh of the seal ; and others bury their tube 
in the unctuous blubber of the whale. 

If we compare the animals of the above Orders with each 
other, we shall find that they are fitted by their Creator to 
collect their food in diflferent ways. The Lepadites, by means 
of their long contractile flexible tube, can rise or sink, and 
bend themselves in different directions, so as, in some sort, to 
pursue their prey ; their tentacles, also, from their greater 
length, seem to further this end: these, according to PoU's 
metaphor above alluded to, they can throw out and draw in 
laden with Hy, as a fisherman does his net. When their 
prey is in their mouth, it is subjected to the action of their 
toothed jaws, which seem more numerous and powerful than 
those of the Balanites; and as the valves forming the shell are 
more numerous and connected by membrane, and the whole 
shell more compressed than the operculum of the last named 
animals, we may suppose that they are capable of a more varied 
action, and one that may perhaps add to the momentum of 
the masticating organs. Hence we may conjecture that the 
animals destined to form their nutriment, may be larger, so as 
to require more exertion and force, both to take and to mas- 
ticate. 

In the other Order, the structure of the Balanites seems to in- 
dicate merely the protrusion and employment of their tentacles; 
and being usually attached to floating bodies, such as the hulls 
of ships, or parasitic upon locomotive animals, riding as they 
do upon the back of the turtle, the dolphin, and the whale, 
they may visit various seas in security, and feast all the while, 
wnth little trouble and exertion, upon animalcules of every 
description, the produce of artic, temperate, and tropical seas. 

With respect to their place in nature, it seems not quite 
clear whether they should be regarded as leading from the Mol- 
luscans, with which Cuvier arranges them, towards the Crus- 
taceans, and they certainly seem to have organs borrowed from 
both ; their shells and mantle in some degree from one, and 

1 Coronula testudinaria . 



192 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

their palpigerous mandibles and jointed organs, proceeding in 
pairs from a common footstalk — like the interior antennse of 
the lobster — and knotty spinal chord from the other: but with 
respect to their jointed organs, I must observe that they still 
more closely resemble those of some of the Encrinites,^ like 
them being fringed on each side, though not with organs of 
that description. A learned naturalist, Mr W. S. Mac Leay, 
is of opinion that the Echinidans, or sea urchins, exhibit some 
approximation to the Balanites.^ If, indeed, we compare the 
genus Coronula with an Echinus, we shall discover several 
points in which their structure agrees. We learn from La- 
marck, that the pieces of the so called operculum, which close 
the mouth of the former shell, are affixed rather to the animal 
than to the shell. Thus the operculum, in some sort, repre- 
sents the jaws of an Echinus, though consisting of fewer pieces, 
and the tube appears divided into alleys, like the crust of that 
animal. These circumstances seem to prove some affinity be- 
tween the Cirripedes and Radiaries; they appear also to have 
some points in common with Savigny's Nereideans, especially 
Amphitrite.^ Weighing all these circumstances, I have thought 
it best to place the Cirripedes immediately before the Entomos- 
tracan Crustaceans. 

But what if these Cirripedes should at last prove to be, not 
the guides to the great Crustacean host, but its legitimate pro- 
geny 1 This has been asserted, at least partially, by a modern 
zoologist, who has assigned his reasons for this singular and 
startling opinion. I will not say the thing is impossible — for 
with God all things are possible — but it certainly appears in 
the highest degree improbable. That a Zoea should become 
a crab is sufficiently extraordinary, and an opinion, as La- 
treille remarks, which, if it be not erroneous, has great need 
of support from experiment:* but that a locomotive animal, 
gifted with eyes and legs, should, by an extraordinary meta- 
morphosis, in its perfect state, become a barnacle, without 
head, eyes, or locomotive organs, can never be admitted till 
confirmed by repeated experiments of the most able and prac- 
tised zoologists, so as to place the matter beyond dispute. I 
by no means, however, mean to assert that Mr Thompson did 
not think he saw what he has stated, in both cases, to take 
place, but he was probably deceived by appearances in some 
such way as he states Slabber to have been."' 

A single fact, observed by Poll, is sufficient \o overiiun tl)is 

1 Plate III. B. Fig. 1. 2 Hor. Ent. i. 312. 3 Ihid. 

4 Cours D'Entomologie, i. 385. 5 Zool. Research, No. i 7. 



CIRRIPEDES. 193 

whole hypothesis. This illustrious conchologist relates that he 
had an opportunity of examining the immense fecundity of 
the sessile barnacles. "In the beginning of June he found 
innumerable aggregations of them, covering certain boats that 
had been long stationary, which, when closely examined, were 
so minute, that single shells were not bigger than the point of 
a needle ; and that from that time they grew very rapidly, 
and arrived at their full size in October." These very minute 
ones must have been hatched from the egg, and not produced 
from larves. 

With regard to the functions and instincts of these Cirri- 
pedes, very little has been observed. We see from the above 
account of them, that, like many other animals amongst the 
lowest grades of the animal kingdom, they are furnished with 
particular organs adapted to the capture of animalcules and 
other minor inhabitants of the deep, which they help to keep 
within due limits. Probably they act upon the substances to 
which they attach themselves, and promote the decomposition 
of shells, and other exuviae of defunct animals, and also of the 
rocks and hgneous substances on w^hich they take their station. 
Of this we are sure, that they work His work who gave them 
being, and assigned them their several stations in the world of 
waters. 



CRINOIDEANS, 

In the deepest abysses of the ocean, it is probable, lurks a 
tribe of plant-like animals, to judge from its numerous fossil 
remains, abounding in genera and species that are very rarely 
seen in a recent state, and which, from a supposed resemblance 
between the prehensory organs or arms, surrounding the head 
or mouth of several species belonging to the tribe, when their 
extremities converge, to the blossom of a liliaceous plant, have 
been denominated Encrinites and Crinoi deans. ^ It was not my 
original intention, as little or nothing was known with respect 
to the habits and station of the few recent ones that have been 
met with — except that one has been taken in the seas of Eu- 
rope, and three in the West Indies, namely, near Martinique, 
Barbados, and Nevis — to have introduced them into the pre- 
sent work, but having subsequently seen fragments of a speci- 
men, taken either in the Atlantic or Pacific, I am not certain 
which, and upon examining it under the microscope, finding 

1 From icfi*ov, a lily. 



194 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

evident traces of suckers on the underside of its fingers, and of 
tlie tentacles that form its fringes/ a circumstance I found 
afterwards mentioned by Ellis, and which throws some light 
upon their economy, I felt that I ought not to pass them wholly 
without notice, and finding in the Hunterian Museum a very 
fine specimen which does not appear to have been figured, for 
the figure given by Ellis seems to have been taken from Dr 
Hunter's specimen, now at Glasgow, and Mr Miller's from a 
specimen of Mr Tobin's, now in the British Museum, by the 
kind permission of the Curators of the Museum in Lincoln's 
Inn Fields, I was allowed to have a .figure of it taken by my 
artist, Mr C. M. Curtis.'^ 

Lamarck has placed the Crinoideans, led probably by their 
plant-like aspect, in the same Order with his Floating Polypes,^ 
not aware that the majority are evidently fixed, but Cuvier 
and most modern zoologists consider them, with more reason, 
as forming a family of the Stelleridans, from which the way to 
them is by the genus Comatula, remarkable for its jointed rays 
fringed on each side. The Marsupites, as Mr Mantell, after 
Mr Miller, has observed, form the link which connects the 
proper or pedunculated Crinoideans with the Stelleridans. If 
we compare them again with the class last described, the Cir- 
ripedeSf especiall)?^ the Lepadites, we shall find several points 
which they possess in common. In the first place both sit 
upon a footstalk, though of a different structure and substance; 
the animal in both, in its principal seat, is protected by shelly 
pieces or valves ; the head or mouth in both, is surrounded by 
dichotomizing articulated organs, involuted, and often converg- 
ing at the summit, and fringed on each side, in the Crinoi- 
deans, with a series of lesser digitations, and in the Cirripedes 
with a dense fringe of hairs. If the opinion of Mr W. S. 
• Mac Leay, stated above, that some of the Echinoderms exhibit 
an approximation to some of the Cirripedes, is correct, as it 
seems to be, the Crinoideans, though still far removed, would 
form one of the links that concatenate them ; or if their con- 
nection is thought merely analogical, the Balanites would be 
the analogues of the Echinidans and of the sessile Crinoideans, 
and the Lepadites of (he pedunculated ones. 

The following characters distinguish the Pentacnnitcs, to 
which Tribe all the known recent species belong. 

Animal, consisting of an angular flexible column, composed 
of numerous joints, articulating by means of cartilage, and pcr- 

1 ri.ATi. 111. li. Fig. 2. 'J Ihi,!. Fi... I 

3 Polypi natanUs. 



CRINOIDEANS. ' 195 

forated for the transmission of a siphon or intestinal canal, and 
sendirij^ forth at intervals, in whorls, several articulated cylin- 
drical branches, curving into a hook at their summit; fixed at 
its base, and supporting at its free extremity a cup-like body, 
containing the mouth and larger viscera, consisting of several 
pieces, terminating above in five (or six) dichotomizing, artic- 
ulated, semi-cyhndrical arms, fringed with a double series of 
tentacular jointed digitations, furnished below on each side 
with a series of minute suckers : these arms, when expanded, 
resemble a star of five (or six) rays, and when they converge, 
a pentapetalous or hexapetalous liliaceous flower. The whole 
animal, when alive, is supposed to be invested with a gelatin- 
ous muscular integument. 

In the specimen figured by Mr Ellis, and that in the Hun- 
terian Museum, there appear to be six arms springing from the 
so-called pelvis, but the natural number appears to be five, cor- 
responding with the pentagonal column. Mr Miller seems to 
be of opinion that the species described by M. Guettard, and that 
which he has himself figured, are the same species, and sy- 
nonymous with the his Asteria of Linne and the Encrinus Caput 
Medusod of Lamarck, but to judge from the figures of the first 
in Parkinson,! and of the other in Miller,^ compared with that 
which is given in this work,^ the last seems to differ from both, 
as well in the pelvis, as in the dichotomies, and length of the 
arms ; its suckers likewise appear to be circular,* and not an- 
gular as they are described by Mr Miller under the name of 
plates.^ If this observation turns out correct, I would distin- 
guish the last species by the name of Pentacrinus Asteria. 

The stem of the Crinoideans consists of numerous joints, 
united by cartilages, which exhibit several peculiarities ; in the 
first place the upper and under side is beautifully sculptured, so 
as to represent a star of five rays, or a pentapetalous flower ; 
the Creator's object in this structure appears to be the attach- 
ment of the cartilage that connects them, and, perhaps, to 
afford means for a degree of rotatory motion, as well as to pre- 
vent dislocations, and also to increase the flexure of the stem 
according to circumstances, and the will of the animal. For 
the transmission of the siphon, whether a spinal chord, or in- 
testinal canal, or both, each joint of the column is perforated, 
the aperture being round in some, and floriform in others. The 
whole stem, with its whorls of branches, exhibits a striking 

1 Organic Remains, ii. t. xix. /.I. 2 Crino'idea, 48. t. I. 

3 Plate III. B. Fig. 1. 4 Ibid. Fig. 2. 

5 Ubi supr. 54. t. ii./. 6. 



196 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

resemblance to the branch of the common horse-tail.^ The 
entire structure seems calculated to enable the animal to bend 
its stem, which appears very long, in any direction, like the 
Lepadites, and thus as it were to pursue its prey; we may sup- 
pose that the branching arms, fingers, and their lateral organs, 
when they are extended horizontally and all expanded, must 
form an ample net, far exceeding that of the Cirripedes, which, 
when they have their prey within its circumference, by con- 
verging their arms, and closing all their digitations, and em- 
ploying their suckers, they can easily so manage as to prevent 
the escape of any animal included within the meshes of their 
net. 

With regard to their functions, and what animals their 
Creator has given a charge to them to keep within due limits, 
little can be known by observation; as nothing like jaws has 
been discovered in them, in which they differ from the Cirri- 
pedes, it should seem that either their food must consist of 
animalcules that require no mastication, or, if they entrap 
larger animals, that they must suck their juices, which seems 
to be Mr Miller's opinion.^ This idea is rendered not improba- 
ble by the vast number of suckers by which their fingers, and 
their lateral branches or tentacles as they are called, are fur- 
nished ; by these they can lay fast hold of any animal too 
powerful to be detained in their net by any other means, and 
subject it to the action of their proboscis. 

From the great rarity of recent species of these animals, it 
should seem that the metropoHs of their race is in the deepest 
abysses of the world of waters. " It appears," says Bosc,^ 
" that the species were extremely numerous in the ancient 
world, perhaps, those actually in existence are equally so, for 
I suspect that all inhabit the depths of the ocean, a place in 
which they may remain to eternity without being known to 
man." 

Naturalists very often, too hastily, regard species as extinct, 
that are now found only in a fossil state, forgetting that there 
may be many stations fitted for animal or vegetable life, that 
are still, and, perhaps, always will be inaccessible to the inves- 
tigator of the works of the Creator, where those mourned over 
as for ever lost, may be flourishing in health and vigour. 

1 Equisehnn arvense. 2 Crinoidea, 54. 

3 JV. D. D'Hist. Nat. x. 224, 



CHAPTER XIV. 

Functions and Instincts. Entomostracan Condylopes. 

We are now arrived at a great branch of the animal kingdom, 
which, in its higher tribes, exhibits Divine Wisdom, acting, in 
and by the instincts of creatures, small indeed in bullc, but 
mighty in operation, in a way truly admirable, indicating, in a 
most striking manner, the source from which it proceeds. 

Some modern zoologists do not regard this vast and interest- 
ing branch as forming a group by itself, but have associated 
with it, under a common name, several of the preceding 
classes. Carus, in his Class of Articulated Animals,^ includes 
Lamarck's Worms and Jlnnelidans ; and Dr Grant, in his Sub- 
kingdom, bearing the same appellation, adds to these the Wheel- 
animalcules,^ and Cirripedes.^ 

I cannot help thinking, however — taking the whole of their 
organization and structure into consideration, particularly their 
powers and means of locomotion and prehension — that it is 
best to regard those animals having jointed legs, and, mostly, 
a body formed of two or more segments, as constituting a sepa- 
rate Sub-kingdom. This is the view that my late illustrious 
and lamented friend, Latreille, has taken of this great group, 
named by him, from the above circumstance, Condylopes,'^ which 
term, since that of Annulose animals,^ sometimes used, is syno- 
nymous with Jlnnelidans, I shall adopt in the present work. 

The distinctive characters of this great group, or Sub-king- 
dom, may be given in few words : 

Animal, not fixed by its base, but locomotive. 

Body, in the great majority, consisting of two or more seg- 
ments. 

Legs, jointed. 

The first of these characters distinguishes the Condylopes 
from the last class, the Cirripedes, which are fixed by their base, 
whereas the present tribe are more free in their motions than 
most of the animals of the preceding groups ; and the two last 

1 Jlrticulata. 2 Rotifer a. 3 Cirrhopoda. 

4 Condylopa, from kov^uXoi, joints, and ttouc, a foot. 5 Annulosa. 



198 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

from the Annelidans, which, though annulated, are not insected, 
and have no jointed legs. 

Cuvier, Latieille, and most other zoologists, consider this 
section of the animal kingdom as subdivided into three great 
Classes — Crustaceans, Jlrachnidans, and Insects : Dr Leach, tak- 
ing the respiratory organs for his guide, also begins with three 
priman/ Sections, those, namely, which have gills, those which 
have sacs, and those which have tracheiB, for respiration ; and out 
of these he forms five Classes, viz. Crustaceans, Araclinoidans, 
Acarines, Myriapods, and Insects. The first and last of these 
Classes he further subdivides, each into two Sub-classes : the 
Crustaceans into Entomostracans and Malacostracans ; and In- 
sects into Ametaholians and Metabolians, or those that do not un- 
dergo a metamorphosis, and those that do. So that according 
to his primary Section his system is ternary; according to his 
secondary it is quinary ; and according to his tertiary it is septe- 
nary. I shall mostly follow him in each of these last subdivi- 
sions. 

Having made these remarks upon the Condylopes in general, 
I must now proceed to one of the Classes above enumerated : 
but here, at first, it seems diflicult to ascertain which ought to 
be regarded as forming the first step in an ascending series, — 
a diflSculty, indeed, which often arrests the course of the student 
of the works of his Creator, for, when any one, in a philo- 
sophic spirit, after a careful survey, sits down to trace the paths 
by which Divine Wisdom seems to have passed in the creation, 
and the arrangement and connection of the various groups of 
organized beings, he is lost and bewildered in a most intricate and 
mazy labyrinth, in which paths intersect each other at every 
angle, and when he thinks he is travelling in a straight road 
he often comes to branches leading oflf from it, which render it 
uncertain in which direction he ought to proceed, in order best 
to attain the object he is pursuing. 

Such indeed is the perplexity of animated nature, that it is 
impossible to see clearly the arrangement of the objects that 
constitute either the vegetable or the animal kingdom; and in 
order to get any tolerable notion of them, as God has placed 
them, when we have reached a certain station we are often 
obliged to retrograde, and begin a branch, from the point of 
its divergement, far removed from that to which we have ar- 
rived. 

Latreille, in the last edition of the R^gne Animal, divides his 
Crustaceans into t^oo Sub-classes, the first of which, afler Aris- 
totle, he denominates Malacostracans ;^ and the second, after 

1 Malarostrtira. 



ENTOMOSTRACAN CONDYLOTES. 199 

Mliller, Entomostracans :^ these, on account of a connection 
which seems to exist between them and the King-crab,'^ he 
places immediately before the Jlrachnidans. I agree with this 
learned entomologist, in considering them as inferior to the 
proper Crustaceans, and shall therefore begin tlie Condylope 
group with some account of them. Like the infusory animal- 
cules, they form a kind of centre, sending forth rays to different 
points, some inclosed in a bivalve shell, seeming to tend to- 
wards the Molluscans f others assuming more of the Crustacean 
form ;* a third looking to the Jlrachnidans ;^ and a fourth to the 
Thysanuran, or Sugar-louse tribe f with other forms that might 
be enumerated, some of which are perfectly anomalous, so that 
it appears almost indifferent where they are placed. As there 
is, however, evidently some affinity between the Entomostra- 
cans and the Cirripedes, not only in both being furnished with 
jointed organs for their motions, but also in some of the former 
being inclosed in shells, and in others by the brisk agitation of 
their legs, producing a current in the water to their mouths, 
as De Geer states of the Water-flea :'' this furnishes a further 
argument for placing them next to the latter tribe. 

It is difficult, and next to impossible, to fix upon any charac- 
ters that are common to the whole of this remarkable Class. 
Generally speaking, but not invariably, they are covered, not 
by a calcareous and solid, but by a horny and thin integument. 
They vary considerably in the number of their antennas and 
legs, the former often branching, and used as oars, and the 
latter usually being connected with their respiration, evincing 
the analogy between these legs and the ciliee of the Rotatories, 
and tentacles of the Polypes f in the majority these organs are 
not calculated for prehension. One group of them lives by 
suction and is parasitic upon other aquatic animals: the great 
body, however, masticate their food, but withoutthe aid of max- 
illary legs. Their eyes are generally sessile, and a considerable 
number of them have only one, or rather two eyes enveloped 
by a common cornea.^ 

Latreille, in his Cours D^Entomologie, divides this Class — 
regarded by Linne as forming one genus, which he named 
Monoculus — into six Orders ; but it will be sufficient here to 
adopt his division of them in the Rhgne Animal^ into tivo, which, 
as separating the fresh-water from the marine genera, is more 



1 


Entomostraca. 2 Limulus Polyphemus. 


3 Cypris, &c. 


4 


Branchipus. 5 Limulus. 


6 Cyclops. 


7 


Daphnia Pulez. De Geer, vii. 453. 




8 


See above, pp. 82, 88. 




9 


Roget, B. T. ii. 493. 





200 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

simple, and better suited to my purpose. These Orders he 
names Branchiopods and Poecilopods. 

1. The Branchiopods are all very minute, and several of them 
microscopic animals. Their mouth consists of an upper lip, 
two mandibles, a tongue, and one or two pairs of maxillae. 
Their legs are natatory, connected with their respiration — 
whence their name of Branchiopods, or gill-bearing legs — often 
branching, varying in number from six to more than a hundred. 

2. The Fodcilopods differ from the preceding Order by the 
different structure and uses of their legs, which are not branch- 
ing, and all of them in some, and part of them in others, are 
prehensory and ambulatory, in some part are also branchial 
and natatory. They differ likewise by not having the ordinary 
mandibles and maxillae, which are sometimes replaced by the 
spiny hips of the six first pairs of legs, and, in one tribe, by a 
mouth and oral organs proper for suction. 

There is a tribe of parasitic animals, which neither Cuvier 
uor Latreille have included amongst the Entomostracans, but 
which Audoin and Milne Edwards conjecture are of a Crusta- 
cean type. I am speaking of the Lerneans of the author first 
mentioned, which he has placed, but not without hesitation, in 
his first order,* of Intestinal Worms.^ Dr Nordmann, how- 
ever, has made it evident that they undergo a metamorpliosis 
Httle differing from that of the first Order of the Entomostra- 
cans, the Branchiopods, especially Cyclops ; and he is of opin- 
ion, that, in a system, they would follow that genus. Their 
resemblance is indeed striking in their preparatory states, but 
in their last or perfect state, they differ, and like the Poecilopods, 
are parasitic ; many of them are furnished with a very conspi- 
cuous organ, which I shall afterwards describe, for fixing them- 
selves ; and their form is very different, their body consisting 
of two segments, like that of the Arachnidans,^ though at- 
tached to their abdomen, like many of the Branchiopods, they 
have two egg-pouches.* In fact the Lerneans seem scarcely 
more anomalous amongst the Entomostracans, than the King- 
crab, and other Poecilopods. All things considered, perhaps, 
they may be regarded as forming an osculant group between 
the two Orders. 

The animals of the first Order mostly frequent stagnant wa- 
ters, moving about with great rapidity. They are generally 
regarded as predaceous, and are stated to make tlie infusory 
animalcules their prey, but some are supposed to be herbivo- 

1 JntestinnuT cavitaires. 2 Entozoa, Rud.. 

3 Platk IX. Fig. 5 4 Ibid. J. f. 



ENTOMOSTRACAN CONDYLOPES. 201 

rous, and they abound particularly in waters in which plants 
are vegetating. As the places that they frequent are very 
subject to be dried up in (lie summer-time, it seems probable 
that a kind Providence has fitted them for this event, by giv- 
ing them, as well as the Infusories, powers of reviviscence. 
Latreille thinks that those of them, which, for the protection 
of their slender and frail branching antennse and legs, are 
enclosed in shells, have the power, after drawing in all their 
organs, of hermetically sealing their shells till the return of 
moisture. 

These little animals differ from the Molluscans, and the 
other preceding Classes, by the changes of their integument ; 
they do not, like them, when their advance in growth requires 
it, add to their shells ; but, fixing themselves to some substance 
at hand, they move their limbs, and the valves of their old 
shells, new ones being already formed underneath, and thus 
loosening their exuviae, in a short time they cast those of the 
whole body; of all their limbs, hairs, plumes, even those that 
are invisible to the naked eye. Amongst these exuviae may 
be detected, not merely the cast skin of the external parts, but 
that of the internal also. These moults follow each other at 
an interval of five or six days, and it is not till after the third 
that the animal has acquired the reproductive faculty. 

In the antecedent classes of the animal kingdom, which 
were almost all inhabitants of the water, we have seen no 
instances of animals casting their skins, or undergoing any 
metamorphosis — either in the number or form of their parts — 
in their progress to their adult state. Some few shell-fish, 
indeed, are stated to cast their shells, and form others,* but a 
degree of doubt rests upon the fact. In the^Branchiopods, 
however, a kind of metamorphosis, as well as the moult just 
described, has long been noticed and recorded. 

The young ones of the Cyclops, the animal before mentioned 
as an analogue of the sugar-louse, when first hatched have 
only four legs, their body is nearly round, and has no tail, 
which led Miiller to mistake them for species of a different 
genus f soon afterwards another pair is acquired, which the 
same author regarded as a second genus,^ and so it proceeds 
till it assumes the perfect form of its kind. Nordmann has 
given figures of a very remarkable Lernean parasite,* which 
infests the perch, representing its whole progress, from the egg 



1 See above, p. IGl. 2 Amymone. 

3 Nauplius. 4 Adheres Percarum. 

AA 



202 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

to the perfect insect,* which, like the Cyclops, does not acquire 
all its organs, except at its last metamorphosis. 

Our progress upwards, as far as we have at present pro- 
ceeded, has been a gradual advance, form after foim appearing 
upon the stage of animal existence, each diplinguished by 
characters indicating an elevation as to rank and station. But 
in the animals amongst which the law in question obtains, we 
see the same individual, at different periods of its existence, 
assuming a higher tone of character, and often endued with 
organs that fit it for a more extended range. Sometimes from 
being purely aquatic, it becomes a denizen of the earth and 
the air — or of earth, air, and water at once — and, with this 
change of character and organs, its Creator wills it to under- 
take a new charge in the general arrangement of functions 
and duties. 

It will be recollected that a very considerable portion of 
the food of the higher creatures, especially the birds, is derived 
from animals that undergo a metamorphosis ; and, that the ma- 
jority of these in their firststate, are more bulky, and contain more 
nutritive substance than they do when arrived at their last, 
and, therefore, even in this view, circumstances important to 
the general welfare may arise from this disposition, and variety 
of food may also be produced, and more enjoyment to the vari- 
ous animals who are destined to live by the myriad forms of 
the insect world. 

Whether the higher Orders of Crustaceans undergo a real 
metamorphosis has not been satisfactorily proved. They are 
known to change their shells annually, but it has not been 
observed that this moult is attended by any change of form, or 
by the acquisition of new locomotive or other organs. . In- 
sects, we know, after their last change do not increase in size ; 
the Crustaceans are found, however, to vary very much in this 
respect. Whether a different law obtains amongst them, from 
what takes place in insects, and they follow the Batrachian 
reptiles, which, after they have exchanged the tadpole for the 
frog, grow till they have arrived at the standard of their respect- 
ive species, I cannot certainly affirm; but reasoning from ana- 
logy, it seems more probable that the crustaceans should follow 
the law of animals most nearly related to them, and belonging to 
the same primary group, than that they should copy the rep- 
tiles, animals far removed from them, and of a completely dif- 
ferent organization. 

There is another point in which this subject of animal nieta- 

1 Tlatb IX. Egg, Fig. 1, 2. Larva, Fig. 3. Pujm, Fig. 4. Imago, 
Fig. 5. 



ENTOMOSTRACAN CONDYLOPES. 203 

morphoses may be viewed. Do not, these successive changes 
in the outward form, functions, and locomotions of so many 
animals preach a doctrine to the attentive and duly impressed 
student of animal forms, and their history — do they not sym- 
bohcally declare to him, that the same individual may be 
clothed vvitli different forms, in different states of existence, 
that he may be advanced, after certain preparatory changes, 
and an intermediate interval of rest and repose, to a much 
more exalted rank ; with organs, whether sensiferous or loco- 
motive, of a much wider range ; with tastes more refined; with 
an intellect more developed, and employed upon higher ob- 
jects ; with affections more spiritualized, and further removed 
from gross matter 1 

The multiplication of these creatures, which, like the Aphides, 
are oviparous at one time, and viviparous at another, is some- 
times prodigious, and only exceeded by that of the Infusories. 
A female Cyclops, the animal before alluded to, in the space of 
three months, after one fecundation which serves for several 
successive generations, lays her eggs ten times, and it has been 
calculated that from only eight of these oyipositions, allowing 
forty for each, she might be the progenitrix, incredible as it 
might seem, of four milliards and a half, or four thousand five 
hundred millions ! !^ Another animal belonging to a genus of 
the present order,^ was observed by Captain Kotzebue in such 
myriads that the sea exhibited a red stripe, a mile long, and a 
fathom broad, produced by a species, individually viewed, 
scarcely visible to the naked eye. How astonishing is the re- 
flection, that in so short a space, in the case of the Cyclops, a 
single individual should be gifted by its Creator to fill the 
waters w4th myriads of animated beings, supposing a single 
impregnated female at first to have been the surviving inhabi- 
tant of any given pool or ditch. Conjecture is lost when we 
meditate upon the mysterious subject. How can life, as 
originally imparted, at the interval of a few months be so mul- 
tiphed and subdivided, as, that such infinite shoals of beings 
shall each have a share in the wonderful bequest. But, when 
we reflect that an Omnipresent Deity is everywhere mighty 
in operation, working all in all, and that he guideth all the 
powers of nature, as the rider guideth the horse upon which he 
sitteth, to answer the purposes of his providence f we may 
easily conceive, that under his superintendence the thing may 

1 Latreille Cours D'Entomologie, i. 421. 2 Calanus, 

3 1 Cor. xii. 6. Ps, Ixviii. 4, 33. 



204 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

be accomplished, though how it is accomplished, must always 
remain an unfathomable mystery. 

These powers of mukiplication are, however, given to these 
creatures for a wise and beneficent purpose. They themselves 
afford a supply of food to a variety of creatures — to numerous 
aquatic insects, even polypes and worms; and to many fishes 
and birds, by whom their numbers are hourly and greatly 
diminished. As the stagnant waters likewise, in which they 
abound, are apt to be dried up in the summer season, many of 
them probably perish ; but, in some, animation may be sus- 
pended till the places they inhabit are again filled with water. 
I have found the little animal described by Dr Shaw, in the 
Linnean Transactions, as the Cancer stagnalis of Linne, in horse- 
hoof prints, in the spring, then filled with water, but which 
had been previously quite dry. 

The finny tribes of the world of waters seem more particu- 
larly exposed to the invasion of parasitic foes ; as far as they 
are known there is scarcely a fish that swims that is not infested 
by more than one of these enemies; even the mightiest mon- 
sters of the ocean, the gigantic whale, the sagacious dolphin, 
the terrific and all-devouring shark, cannot defend themselves 
from them. Where they abound they doubtless generate 
diseases, and are amongst the means employed by a watchful 
Providence to keep within proper limits the inhabitants of the 
waters; and probably there are other benefits which our im- 
perfect knowlege of their history prevents us from duly appre- 
ciating, that are conferred, through these animals, upon the 
oceanic population. Their prevalence upon the predaceous 
fishes, as was before observed, may tend to dimish their ravages 
by lessening their activity ; while to those of a milder charac- 
ter, within certain bounds and under certain circumstances, 
they may be beneficial rather than injurious. 

Of this description is the tribe of Lerneans, above alluded to 
as intermediate between the Branchiopod and Pa^cilopod En- 
tomostracans ; of which I cannot select a more interesting 
species to exemplify the adaptation of the structure to the 
instinct and functions, than one described and figured by Dr 
Nordmann, under the appropriate name of Adheres Percaruniy^ 
or Pest of the Perch. 

This animal, like the Branchiopods, is found in fresh water, 
where it attaches itself to the common, and another species of 
the perch genus,^ and takes its station usually within the 
mouth, fixing itself, by means of its sucker, in the cellular 

1 hx^»Mt -Annoying. 2 PercuJluviatilisejndP.lucioperca. 



ENTOMOSTRACAN CONDYLOPES. 205 

membrane, so deeply that it cannot disengage itself, or be ex- 
tracted by external force, without rupturing the so called arms, 
that are attached to the sucker, and leaving it behind. The 
animal often fixes itself to the palate, and even to the tongue. 
The arms* take their rise at the base of the cephalothorax — as 
the part consisting of head and thorax, not separated by a 
suture, is called — where they are very robust and thick, but 
they taper towards the other extremity, a single sucker,^ com- 
mon to both, being, as it were, hooked to them. These arms 
are bent nearly into a circle, surrounding the cephalothorax, 
and the sucker is in front of the head: their substance is carti- 
laginous, and they repose in the same plane with the head ; 
whence we may conjecture that the animal, when fixed and 
engaged in suction, lies close to the part where it has taken 
its station. When we consider that these predaceous fishes 
often gorge their prey, swallowing it entire, we see how neces- 
sary it was that our parasite should be thus fitted to fix itself 
firmly, and root itself, as it were, that it may be enabled to 
withstand the pressure and violent action of the bodies that 
pass over it, for the palate and tongue of a Perch must be a 
perilous station. This purpose seems further aided by a quan- 
tity of sahva, usually formed around it. 

These pests of the perch are themselves subject to the in- 
cursions and annoyance of animals still niore minute than 
themselves. A small species of mite^ makes them its prey, 
and when the saliva just mentioned is removed, they are often 
found quite covered by a species of Infusory belonging to the 
genus Vorticella. 

The next Order, including all the marine Entomostracans, 
will not detain us long. The first section consists of a single, 
but very remarkable, genus, the type of which is the Monocu- 
lus Polyphemus of Linne.* In the West Indies it is called, by 
way of eminence, the King-crab, and is found in the seas both 
of the East and West, from the equator to the 40th deg. of 
latitude. The species are few, and near to each other. They 
differ widely both in their characters and form from every other 
Crustacean tribe. Like the Cirripedes, they have no distinct 
head; their crust is divided into two portions, .the anterior 
embracing the posterior, and being terminated, like the Rays, 
to which they present an analogy, by a long angular tail. 
They have both compound and simple eyes; the first are situ- 

1 Plate IX. Fig. 5. c, c. 2 Ibid. Fig. 5. d. 

3 Gamasus scabriculus. 4 Limulus. — Miill. 



206 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

ated, one in the middle of each lateral ridge, usually under 
the spine on the outer side; the second, or simple eyes, are on 
each side of the intermediate ridge, where it hegins : these last 
are very minute, and not easily discoverable. The under side 
of the shield, or anterior portion of the crust, is deeply hollowed 
for the reception of the body, and the cavity is marked out 
anteriorly by an emarginate ridge, which gives it something 
the appearance of the hooded serpent. Some of them attain 
to a large size, the species found near the Molucca Islands 
being sometimes two feet in length. 

The head in them, as in the Arachnidans, seems suppressed, 
or to merge in the thorax, which also, as in that Class, bears the 
eyes, the outer pair corresponding with those of certain Crusta- 
ceans in which they are sessile, and the inner pair being like 
those of the Arachnidans, but they have neither the oral organs 
nor the legs of the Class just named. In fact, these animals 
seem to stand in much the same position amongst the Ento- 
mostracans, that the Cephalopods do amongst the Molluscans, 
and moreover as giants amongst pigmies. Time will probably 
throw more light upon these singular works of the Creator. 

Their most remarkable organ is their tail, which is probably 
of considerable service to them in their locomotions. It is 
shaped like a stiletto, and is so extremly sharp at the extremity, 
that it will easily pierce the flesh, and may perhaps be used 
by the animal as a weapon, as it is said to be by the Indians ; 
it is so articulated with the posterior piece of the crust as to 
move with more ease upwards and downwards than laterally. 
Comparing the small body with the vast volume and levity of 
the crust which covers and protects it, and considering that the 
animal, as M. Latreille has remarked, passes the night with 
its anterior half out of the water, we may conjecture that, by 
the depression of the tail, it may be elevated in part above the 
water, and remain stationary. By a slight inclination on either 
side it probably also helps to steer it, and as it is ciliated at the 
base, like the natatory legs of a Dtjticus, it may be of some use 
in swimming. The legs are all armed with pincers, like those 
of a crab, from wiiich it seems evident that it is predaceous, 
and, from their sir,all size, tliat its prey must consist of minute 
animals. 

The whole of its structure appears calculated to give the 
king-crab more tlian usual buoyancy, the reasons of which, 
when its history is better known, will be more fully understood ; 
and the Power, Wisdom, and Goodness that everywhere flash 
upon us, when we consider animal structures and their adapta- 
tion to liicir habits and instincts, when fully investigated, will 



ENTOMOSTRACAN CONDYLOPES. 207 

be duly appreciated. It is said that this creature, amongst the 
ancient Japanese, was the symbol of the zodiacal sign Cancer. 

The animals belonging to the second section of the PoeciU- 
pods differ from all the rest, by the manner in which they lake 
tlieir food. They are parasitic upon Cetaceans, fishes, some 
reptiles, and Crustaceans, wliose juices they imbibe by suction. 
They are often fixed to the gills of these animals, but nothing 
further interesting is known of their history. Some have two 
long jointed tails, like ephemerae,^ and others are distinguished 
by a remarkable lateral elongation of the thorax.'^ Some fix 
themselves to their prey by means of suckers, terminating their 
first pair of legs,^ which the remainder have not. 

The observation of Dr Von Baer, quoted in a former part of 
this work,* that the lowest grades of the animal kingdom ex- 
hibit the leading types of the various organizations it contains, 
for reasons before alluded to, would almost justify the zoologist 
in assigning to the Entomostracans a place amongst the Infu- 
sories. But the subject of centres, in that kingdom, sending 
forth, as it were, rays in different directions, and leading to 
various forms, requires very deep and minute investigation, and 
abundant proof, before it will be safe to adopt it as a principle. 

1 Caligus. 2 JVicothoe. 

3 Argulus. 4 Ante, p. 172. 



CHAPTER XV. 



Functions and Instincts. Crustacean Condylopes. 

We are now arrived at a Class of animals, in which the organs 
of locomotion assume a new and more perfect form, correspond- 
ing in some measure with those of many of the vertebraled 
animals. The advance, in structure, hitherto, from a mouth 
surrounded by organs like rays, serving various distinct pur- 
poses, and by different means contributing to the nutrition, 
respiration, and motions of the animal, has been, by certain 
inarticulate organs, more generally distributed over the body, 
but still in a radiating order; as for instance, the tentacular 
suckers of the Stelleridans and Echinidans, which they use in 
their locomotions, and for prehension, as well as the purposes 
just named. In the Entomostracans, as we have seen, the legs, 
though jointed, are very anomalous, assume various forms, and 
are applied to sundry uses: in the sole instance of the king- 
crab, they lake the articulations of those of the Crustaceans, 
in which we may trace the general structure of the legs of the 
other Classes of Condylopes. 

But as I shall have occasion, in a subsequent chapter, to 
give a concentrated account of the gradual development of 
the organs of locomotion and prehension, from their first rudi- 
ments in the lowest grades of the animal kingdom to their 
state of perfection in the highest, I shall not here, therefore, 
enlarge further upon the subject, than by observing, that, in 
most of the Decapod Crustaceans, the anterior legs are become 
strictly arms, terminating in a kind of didactyle hand, consisting 
of a large joint, incrassated usually at the base, and furnished 
on its inner side with a smaller movable one, constituting 
together a kind of finger and thumb, with which it is enabled 
to seize firmly and hold strongly any object that its inclinations 
or fears point out to it. This hand we called the chela or claw, 
or more properly piricers, of the lobster or crab. We find it also 
in the scorpion and hook-crab,* which on shore are in some sort 
analogous to the long-tailed and short-tailed Crustaceans, or 

1 Ckclifcr. 



CRUSTACEAN CONDYLOPES. 209 

lobsters and crabs of the waters. This structure of the hand, 
ill these creatures, is particularly fitted to tlieir wants and situ- 
ation. A hand like ours, consisting of a quadruple set of fingers 
and an opposite thumb, to be of sufficient power for their pur- 
poses, must be so disproportioned to their size, as to be an 
incumbrance rather than a useful instrument of prehension; 
but as now constructed, it lias the requisite strength for the 
purposes of the animal, without being disproportioned to its 
size, and inconvenient for its use. Thus we see how nicely 
every thing is calculated and adjusted by Supreme Wisdom, to 
the nature and circumstances of every animal form. 

But these great claws are by no means universal amongst 
the Crustaceans. In some tlie claws are very small, but the 
loss is often made up to tliese by an increase as to number, so 
that if they cannot lay hold of large animals, they can seize, 
at the same time, several small ones. We liave seen that in 
the king-crab all the legs have these prehensory claws, and 
they vary in number in many of the smaller Crustaceans, as 
the shrimp,^ prawn,^ pandle,^ &c. The foreleg of some of 
these has prehensory claws, that are formed like the mandibles 
or cheliceres of spiders and the arms of the Mantis — whence 
they are called mantis-crabs. Instead of a forceps, consisting 
of a finger and thumb, the claw that arms the extremity of 
the leg is folded down, and received into a channel of the shank, 
and kept from dislocation by a tooth, or spine, at the base: this 
structure may be seen in the shrimp. 

There is another circumstance, distinguishing the decapod 
and stomapod Crustaceans, that is peculiar to them, their eyes 
are placed upon jointed footstalks, so that when they want to 
explore and examine what passes around them, they can im- 
mediately erect these organs, and so greatly enlarge their 
sphere of vision, but when they have retired to their retreats 
in the cavities of the rocks, or to burrows that they have formed, 
they can place them in repose, in a cavity provided for them by 
their Creator, in the head. 

Any person, who casts an eye over these creatures, will be 
struck by repeated analogical forms, representing some terres- 
trial animals of the sam'e Sub-kingdom. Thus a large number 
of those distinguished by the shortness of their tails, the crahs^ 
present, both in their retrogressive and, lateral motions and 
general aspect, an astonishing resemblance to many Arachni- 
dans; some imitating spiders, and others phalangians:* and, 

1 Crangon vulgaris. 2 PahBmon serratus. 

3 Pandalus. 4 Macropodia Phalangium. 

BB 



210 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

amongst the long-tailed tribe the lobsters, one^ very accurately 
represents a scorpion, and another a manlis.^ 

We have seen the same tendency in the Annelidans to ap- 
proach or imitate terrestrial forms, as if the marine and aquatic 
animals were anxious to quit their fluid medium, and to become 
inhabitants of the dry land. The animal living on shore and 
in the woods at St Vincent, taken for a MoUuscan by Mr Guild- 
ing,^ appears almost like a creature that had succeeded in such 
an attempt. 

All these resemblances and approximations show, that the 
great Creator embraced at one view all the forms to which he 
intended to give being, and created no individual without fur- 
nishing it with organs which give it some relation to others; or 
so moulding its outward form, as to cause it to represent some 
others to which it is clear it is not brought near by any charac- 
ters, common to both, that indicate affinity. What can more 
evidently and strongly manifest design, and that of a mind com- 
prehending simultaneously the whole world of created beings, 
than thus to concatenate all link to link and wheel within 
wheel, through all their intricate revolutions and ramifications 
connecting and connected, and all the while reflecting others 
of a higher or a lower grade with mimic features'? this shows 
the hand, the art, the wisdom, the power, and the goodness of 
that unfathomable depth and immeasurable height of Deity, 
which comprehends all things and is comprehended by none; 
and to whom all things owe their being, and their form, and 
their organs, and their several places and functions. 

The general characters of the present class are — 
Body apterous, covered by a calcareous crust, divided into 
segments. Legs jointed, 10 — 16. jyiouth composed of a Up, 
tongue, a pair of mandibles, often bearing a feeler, and two pairs 
of maxillce, covered by maxillary legs. Spinal chord knotty, 
terminating anteriorly in a small brain. A heart and vessels for 
circulation. Respiration by gills. 
These are divisible into five orders. 

1. Decapods. Gills situated under the sides of the shell. 
Ten thoracic legs. Eyes on a jointed footstalk. 

2. Stomapods. Gills aitached to five pairs of appendages, 
or spurious legs, under the abdomen. Eyes as in the 
Decapods. 

3. Lmmipods. No abdominal appendages. Eyes sessile. 

1 ThaJassina Scorpioidcs. 2 Squiila Mantis. 

3 Sep p. lH7,Pr,ATr. VTlt. Fig. 1. 



CRUSTACEAN CONDYLOPES. 211 

4. Jlmphipods. Head distinct. Eyes sessile. 

5. Isopods. Head distinct. Eyes sessile. Legs sinnple, 
equal. 

1. Decapods. This order naturally resolves itself into two 
sections, viz. The short-tailed Decapods or Crabs,^ which have 
their abdomen folded under the trunk: and the long-tailed 
Decapods or Lobsters, Cray -fish, &c.^ whose abdomen is always 
extended. 

Writers on the Crustaceans usually begin with the short- 
tailed, and then proceed to the long-tailed Decapods, and this 
arrangement seems natural, when the transit is to those with 
sessile eyes, such as the locust-crab f but yet when we con- 
sider how nearly related to the spiders the former animals are, 
and that in the latter, though the head is not formed by a dis- 
tinct suture dividing it from the thorax, yet its contour is 
strongly marked out externally by an impression, and inter- 
nally by a ridge, at least in the lobster andcray-fish, — it seems 
as if the two tribes should form two parallel lines, and pro- 
ceed, side by side, towards the Arachnidans and Myriapods. 

I shall, however, follow the usual plan, and give now some 
account of the crabs. Of these, none are more remarkable than 
what have been denominated land-crabs, from their usually 
living on shore, and making for the sea only at certain seasons. 
Of the most noted species of these I have already given a full 
account,* but I shall here notice some others, having the same 
habits, that will interest the reader. Aristotle, long ago, 
noticed a crab of this description, found in Phoenicia, under the 
name of the Horseman,^ which he says runs so fast that it is 
not easy to overtake it.^ Olivier found this account true of 
those he saw on the coast of Syria ; and Bosc observed a spe- 
cies'' in Carolina, which he had some trouble to overtake on 
horseback and shoot with a pistol. These horsemen crabs are 
found only in warm climates, where they inhabit sandy spots 
near the shore, or the mouths of rivers. They make burrows 
in the sand, to which they retreat when alarmed, and in which 
they pass the night. 

Another kind of land-crab^ is distinguished by the extraor- 
dinary disproportion of its claws; one of them, sometimes the 
left and sometimes the right, being enormously large, while 



c. 2. 



1 


Brachyuri. 


2 


Macrouri. 


3 


Orchesia Utterea. 


4 


See above, p. 66". 


5 


iTTTTiUg. Gr. 


6 


Hist. Anim. L iv. 


7 


Ocypode Hippeus, probably Cancer Cursor. 


L. 




8 


Gelasimus vocans. 







2l3 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

the Other is very small, and often concealed, so that the ani- 
mal appears single-handed. This formation, however, is not 
without its use, for, when retired into its burrow, it employs 
this large claw to stop up the mouth of it, which secures it from 
intrusion, and this organ is in readiness to seize such animals 
as form its food and come within its reach. They have the 
habit of holding up the great one, as if they were beckoning 
some one ; but this doubtless is an attitude of defence. These 
crabs live in moist places, near the shore. They attack, in 
crowds, any carrion, and dispute the possession of it with the 
vultures; they do not willingly enter the water, except when 
they lay and hatch their eggs, and it is conjectured that their 
young are for some time entirely aquatic. One kind of them,* 
which forms numerous burrow^ s, remaining in them during three 
or four months in the winter, usually stops them up, so that 
the animals are obliged to reopen them when the warmth of 
the vernal sun bids them come forth again from their winter 
quarters. They are devoured by numerous animals, — otters, 
bears, birds, tortoises, and other reptiles, all prey upon them, 
but their multiplication is so excessive, that there seems no 
sensible diminution of their numbers. 

The next tribe of Decapods are the long-tailed ones, which 
do not fold their abdomen under their body. This part is 
usually furnished at the extremity with several plates, which 
the animal expands so as to form a fan of five or six leaves ; 
they are easily seen in the common lobster;'' like the tail of 
birds, they are useful to the animal in its passage through an 
element that requires to be moved by organs of a firmer con- 
sistence than feathers. The lateral ones in the species just 
named, having a kind of articulation, so that they can be par- 
tially depressed, and push against the plane they are moving 
upon ; they do not, like the crabs, quit the water, and are 
some of them, as the cray-fish,^ fresh-water animals. 

I shall begin with a tribe which, in some degree, connects 
the crab with the lobster, these are what are denominated 
Hermit-crabs,'^ whose abdomen being naked, and unprotected 
by any hard crust, their Creator has given them an instinct, 
which teaches them to compensate this seeming defect, by 
getting possession of some univalve shell, suited to their size, 
which becomes their habitation, and which they carry about 
with them as if they were its proper inhabitants. These crabs 

1 G. Pugillator. 2 Asta^nis Gammnrus. 

3 Jlstacu9 jiuvititihs 4 Pagurus, PtAtr X. Fi». 2. 



CRUSTACEAN CONDYLOPES. 213 

are particularly formed for the habit that distinguishes them. 
Their naked tail has a tendency to a spiral convolution, fitting 
them to inhabit spiral shells, which they usually select for their 
mansion, though, from recent observations, it has been found 
that any univalve will answer their purpose. Their tail is 
terminated by an apparatus of movable and hard pieces,* which 
appear intended to enable the animal (o fix itself more firmly 
in ihe spire of the shell. Usually the right hand claw, which 
is disengaged from the shell, is double the size of the other 
which is not, and is that which is most employed ; but in nar- 
row-mouthed shells, such as the volute, in which Freycinet 
found one, 2 both claws are disengaged, and are of equal size. 
The reason of this formation is evident. The fourth and fifth 
pairs of legs^ are much smaller and shorter, than the anterior 
ones, they have, below the claw, a piece resembling a rasp, 
which appears formed to assist them in moving in the shell, 
whether they wish to move outwards or inwards, and, on one 
side, they have a series of egg-bearing appendages.* This 
whole structure proves that they are formed with this particu- 
lar view of inhabiting the shells of a very different tribe of ani- 
mals. Some of these hermit-crabs, for there are several species 
of them, may be called terrestrial, while others are aquatic. In 
some of the Indian isles, the shores are covered with them. 
When the heat is most intense, they seek the shelter of the 
shrubs, and when the freshness of the evening breathes, they 
run about by thousands, rolling along their shells in the most 
grotesque manner, jostling each other, stumbling, and produc- 
ing a noise by the shock of their encounters, which announces 
their approach before they appear. When they perceive any 
danger, they hastily conceal themselves in any ready made holes 
they meet with, or under the roots, or in the trunks of decayed 
trees, seldom making for the sea, how near soever they may 
be. At Guam, a very large species frequents forests more than 
a mile from the sea ; and in Jamaica, another species, called 
there the soldier,^ has been found in great quanitities on ele- 
vated ground, more than four leagues from it. 

The common species^ is aquatic, and usually inhabits the 
whelk ; it is stated annually to leave its shell, at the time of 
its moult, and after this great crisis is over, to seek another 
suited to its increased magnitude. Aristotle, Belon, and others 
affirm that these animals quit their shell to seek their prey. 



1 


Ibid. 2. a, a, a. 






2 


Pagurus clibfi.v/irius. 


See Plate X. Fig. 2. 




3 


Ibid, b b, c c. 




4 IUd.d,d,d,d. 


5 


Pagurus Diogenes. 




6 P. Bernhardus. 



214 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

and that when danger threatens them, they retreat to it back- 
wards, but observations have not been made by modern authors 
which confirm this statement. Their sexual intercourse how- 
ever, could not take place without their first leaving their 
mansion. 

Why our, so called, hermits are gifted with this singular in- 
stinct, is not easy to conjecture. Many other creatures make 
use of houses that they had no hand in erecting, as the bees, 
the cuckoo, and sometimes the bear, &c. ; but I do not recollect 
any that, as it were, clothe themselves with the cast garments 
of other animals. Providence, besides the defence of their 
otherwise unprotected bodies, has no doubt some object of im- 
portance in view in giving them this instinct. Perhaps they 
may accelerate the decomposition of the shells they inhabit, 
and cause them sooner to give way to the action of the at- 
mosphere; and as all exuviee may be termed nuisances and 
deformities, giving to these deserted mansions an appearance of 
renewed life and locomotion, removes them in some sort from 
the catalogue of blemishes. By this physical hypocrisy, of as- 
suming the aspect of a different animal, which is known as not 
having powerful means of destruction, these creatures may de- 
ceive the unwary, and make them their prey, which if they 
wore the livery of their own tribe, would be on their guard and 
escape them. 

Next to the Hermit-crabs, or rather Hermit-lobsters,* comes 
a very interesting genus, which might be denominated Tree- 
lobsters, from the singular circumstance of their quitting the 
sea, like the Climbing-perch,^ and in the night ascending the 
cocoa-nut and other palm-trees, for the sake of their fruit. 
The species which manifests this remarkable instinct is gigan- 
tic, and must exhibit a striking spectacle when engaged in 
ascending the stem of a cocoa-tree; but Mr Cummings ob- 
served its proceedings in the Polynesian Islands, where he saw 
it ascending the palm-trees and devouring their fruit. I have, 
in a former chapter,^ stated that the Climbing perch ascends the 
fan-palm in pursuit of certain Crustaceans, perhaps related to 
the Birgus, which frequent it. Freycinet observed these crabs, 
in the Marian Islands, and says that their claws have wonder- 
ful strength, for when the animal has seized a stick, an infant 
may be suspended from them. They are very fond of the fruit 
of the cocoa-palm, and may be fed with it for months without 
sufTering from want of water. Whether, like the land-crab, 

1 Birgus LcUro. Plate X. Fig. 1. 

2 See p. 65. 3 See p. 65 



CRUSTACEAN CONDYLOPES. ^15 

they have a reservoir capable of containing a sufficient quan- 
tity of that fluid to keep the gills moist, has not been ascer- 
tained : probably they have. 

Amongst the larger species of the long-tailed Section, there 
is one of the most ferocious aspect, having its head, the base of 
its long antennae, and its thorax, beset with sharp spines. This 
is called in the London market the Thorny lobster,^ and is 
stated sometimes to be nearly a yard in length : it is also called 
the Cray-fish, and by the French, who esteem it highly, the 
Langoustc : it is, however, far inferior to the common lobster, 
from which it is distinguished by having no pincers, its legs 
terminating in a strong simple claw, set with bunches of bris- 
tles, a circumstance indicating a different mode of taking its 
prey. From the amplitude of their fan-like tail, and from their 
natatory plates, these lobsters seem formed for rapid motion in 
the water. 

The next species that I shall mention is of much more im- 
portance to us, and has been celebrated by epicures from an- 
cient times. Instead of unarmed hands and legs, the Lobster,^ 
as every one knows, has the /ormer armed, often with an enor- 
mous pair of claws, which must be of vast power, and, besides, 
the two anterior pairs of their legs are furnished with small 
pincers. It is observable that the movable finger of the claw 
of the hands is on their inner side, while, in these two pairs of 
legs, that on the outside is movable. Aristotle's Carabus^ is 
generally referred to the thorny lobster ; but in one place he 
expressly mentions its using its pincers to catch and carry its 
food to its mouth, which could not apply to that animal, though 
it agrees well with the common lobster ; yet in another place, 
under the same name, he appears to mean the other.* It is 
not known exactly to what use these smaller pincers are ap- 
plied ; it must be observed, however, that if the legs are re- 
garded as naturally pointing towards the head, as in Dr Leach's 
figure of JSTephrops, the movable thumb in all is on the same 
side. The antennse in this genus are about the length of the 
body. The pincers of the hand are very powerful and tuber- 
cular ; they are used by these animals both to seize their prey 
and for self defence, and they contain very powerful muscles. 
When in the water the lobster seizes any thing presented to 
it, and holds it so strongly that it is impossible to extricate it 
without breaking the claw. 

All Crustaceans cast their crust annually. At first it seems 

1 Palinurus vulgaris, Leach. Malacostr. Podophth. t. xxx. 

2 ^stac.us Gammarus. 

3 Gr. Kupct^oc, Hist. Jivhu. 1. viii. o. 2. 4 \hid. 1. ii. c. 2. 



216 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

wonderful how this can be accomplished. With insects, in 
whom it takes place only in the larves, and whose form and 
substance are usually adapted to it, a longitudinal fissure of 
the skin of a soft caterpillar, or grub, when the animal grows 
too big for it, we can conceive to be no difficult task : but 
with animals covered with a hard crust, and in whom not only 
the covering of the head, trunk, and abdomen is to be cast, 
but also that of the legs and other organs, it seems an opera- 
tion infinitely more arduous. But He who gave them this 
defence, instructs them also how to rid themselves of it when 
it grows too strait for them, and has moulded their structure 
accordingly. 

These animals are not, like most insects, limited to an ex- 
istence, terminated within the period of one revolution of the 
earth round the sun, but sometimes witness several; and some 
are said even to live twenty years, and keep growing during 
the greater part of their life. But this would be impossible, 
since it is incapable of extension, unless they could give room 
for the expansion of their body, by occasionally rejecting the 
case which encloses it. At a certain time of the year, about 
the end of the spring, when food is plentiful, they begin to 
feel themselves ill at ease : they then probably seek the clefts 
of the rocks, and other close places, in which they can under- 
go, in concealment and security, a change which exposes them, 
in a defenceless state, to danger. 

But we should have known nothing of the manner in which 
this great work is effected, had not the illustrious French natu- 
ralist, Reaumur, adopted methods which enabled him to ascer- 
tain their mode of proceeding. In the spring, in boxes pierced 
with holes, which he placed both in the river, and in an npart- 
ment, he put the fresh-water ciay-fish,* of the same genus 
with the lobster. He observed that when one of these was 
about to cast its crust, it rubbed its feet one against the other, 
and gave itself violent contortions. After these preparatory 
movements, it swelled out its body more than usual, and the 
first segment of its abdomen appeared more than commonly 
distant from the thorax. The membrane that united them 
now burst, and its new body appeared. After resting for some 
time, it recommenced agitating its legs and other parts, swell- 
ing to the utmost the parts covered by the thorax, which was 
thus elevated and separated from tiie base of the legs ; the 
membrane which united it to the underside of the body burst 



1 Jistanis fivriatilis. 



CRUSTACEAN CONDYLOPES. 211 

asunder, and it only remained attached towards i lie mouth. In 
a few minutes, from this time, the animal was entirely stripped 
except the legs. First the margin of the thorax was seen to 
separate from tlie first pair of legs ; at that instant, drawing 
back its head, after reiterated efforts, it disengaged its eyes 
from their cases, and all the other organs of the anterior part 
of the head ; it next uncased one of its fore legs, or all or part 
of the legs of one side, which operation is so difficult that 
young ones sometimes die under it. When the legs are disen- 
gaged, the animal casts off its thorax, extends its tail briskly, 
and pushes off its covering and that of its parts. After this 
iast action, which requires the utmost exertion of its remaining 
vigour, it sinks into a state of great weakness. Its limbs are 
^0 soft that they bend like a piece of wet paper ; but if the back 
is felt, its flesh appears unexpectedly firm, a circumstance 
arising, perhaps, from the convulsive state of the muscles. 
When the thorax is once disengaged, and the animal has be- 
gun to extricate its legs, nothing can stop its progress. Reau- 
mur often took them out of the water with the intention of 
preserving them half uncased, but they finished, in spite of 
him, their moult in his hands. Upon examining the exuviae 
of these animals, we find no external part wanting; every hair 
is a case which covers another hair. The lower articulations 
of the legs are divided longitudinally at a suture which sepa- 
rates during the operation, but which is not visible in the liv- 
ing animal. 

When we consider this apparently arduous and complex 
operation, we see the most evident proofs of design, and that 
the Creator has so put together the different parts of the ani- 
mal's structure, that there is no occasion to divide the crust 
itself in order to liberate it. Instead of a sohd tube, he has 
inclosed the [eg in joints that are furnished with the means of 
dividing longitudinally, upon sufficient expansion of the in- 
cluded limb, and so opening a way for its liberation. In the 
whole body all the segments and parts are so united by a 
membrane which can yield to the expansive efforts of the ani- 
mal, that the entire liberation of it from the armour that en- 
cases it, is accomplished with infinitely more ease than we 
should expect, even after a careful investigation of it. Besides 
membranous ligaments, so arranged by the Wisdom of the 
Creator as to yield to the efforts of these creatures to liberate 
themselves from their too strait garment, he has also furnished 
them, as Reaumur remarks, with a slimy secretion, which 
moistens the interval between the old and new shell, and faci- 
litates their separation. 

CO 



218 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

The time requisite for hardening the newly acquired crust, 
according to its previous state, is from one to three days. Those 
animals that are ready lo moult have always two stony sub- 
stances called crabs'-eyes, placed in the stomach, which, from 
the experiments of Reaumur and others, appear destined to 
furnish the matter, or a portion of it, of which the shell is 
formed, for if the animal is opened the day after its moult, 
when the shell is only half hardened, these substances are 
found only half diminished, and if opened later they are pro- 
portionably smaller. Thus lias Creative Wisdom provided 
means for the prompt consolidation of the crust of these crea- 
tures, so that it is soon rescued from the dangers to which, in 
its naked state, it is exposed. Reaumur measured several 
cray-fish, before, and after their moult, and found that their 
augmentation amounted to about one-fifth, this amount pro- 
bably decreases as they approach nearer to their adult state. 
From a chemical analysis of the crust of the lobster it has been 
ascertained that it consists of gelatine united to calcareous 
earth ; it differs from the shells of Molluscans in having a much 
greater proportion of gelatine, whereas in the latter the cal- 
careous earth greatly predominates. 

It is asserted that birds, and other animals in tropical coun- 
tries, have two moults within the year, after the two rainy 
seasons are passed, and two broods; whether this is the case 
with Crustaceans has not been ascertained. Most other Con- 
dylopes do not survive the laying of their eggs, but the Crus- 
taceans are evidently exempted from this law, and emulate 
the higher animals in the duration of their existence. 

It may be observed that the moult of Crustaceans differs in 
one respect from that of birds, which only change their feathers, 
and that of quadrupeds who only change their fur, since they 
disengage themselves from their whole external skin with all 
its appendages, whether of fur, or any other substance. Their 
moult resembles rather that of trees, whose outer skin, under 
the form of bark, peels off annually, and is succeeded by an- 
other formed under it, as is particularly evident in the birch, 
plane, &c. 

It is to the researches of the same learned, and patient, and 
penetrating experimenter and naturalist that we are indebted 
for what knowledge we possess of the means employed by nature 
for the reproduction of the mutilated organs of Crustaceans. 
Having cut off the legs of some crabs and lobsters, and placed 
them in covered boats, cummunicating with the water, and des- 
tined to keep fishes or Crustaceans ahvo, at the end of some 
moniiis, he saw that I lie mutilated legs had been replaced by 



CRUSTACEAN CONDYLOPES. 219 

new ones, perfectly resembling the old, and almost as large. 
The time necessary for this reproduction was not fixed, but 
depended upon the warmth of (he season, and the supply of 
food furnished to the animal, and likewise upon the part in 
which the mutilation took place. The point of union of the 
second and third joints, is the part of the leg where a fracture 
is most easily made, and the reproduction is most rapid. At 
this point there are many sutures which appear distinct from 
articulations; it is in these sutures, particularly the interme- 
diate one, that the separation usually occurs, and many Crus- 
taceans, if they are wounded in some other part of their leg, 
cast the remainder off at this suture to facilitate the reparation 
of their loss. So much only is reproduced in each leg as is 
necessary to render it again complete 

When a leg is mutilated in the summer, if examined a day 
or two after the experiment, the first circumstance observable 
is a kind of covering membrane of a reddish hue ; in five or six 
days more this membrane becomes convex ; next it is protruded 
into a conical shape, and keeps gradually lengthening as the 
germinating leg is developed ; at last the membrane is rup- 
tured and the leg appears, at first soft, but in a few days it. 
becomes as hard as the old one ; it now wants only size and 
length, and these it acquires in time ; for at every moult it 
augments in a more rapid proportion than the legs that have 
their proper size. The antennae, maxillae, &c.^ are reproduced 
in the same manner, but if the tail is mutilated, it is never re- 
produced, and the animal dies. When attacked, Crustaceans, 
as well as some of their analogues, the grasshoppers, often cast 
their legs as it were voluntarily. 

When we reflect on this history, we cannot help admiring 
and adoring the goodness of the Creator, and his care over the 
creatures he has made, in giving to these animals, which, both 
from the multiplicity and exposure of their legs, and other 
organs, and their numerous enemies, are particularly liable to 
mutilations, a power that enables them, in a short period, to 
pursue the course directed by instinct, with undiminished or 
little diminished powers. 

The Stomapods, or mouth-legged Crustaceans, so named 
because the maxillary legs do not diflfer materially from the 
thoracic ones, form the second Order of the Class, and the 
species belonging to it, on account of their general resemblance 
to the orthopterous tribe forming Linne's genus Manlis, are 
called Sea-Mantises. One of them,* in its anterior legs, dccu- 

1 Squilla Mantis. 



220 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

rately represents that genus. But the most remarkable animals 
belonging to the Order are the Phyllosomes^ of Dr Leach, which 
in some respects are analogues of the Spectres,^ not having the 
raptorious fore leg of the Squillse, but their thorax, which con- 
sists of two segments, the first very much dilated, approaches 
nearer to that of Mantis strumaria.^ It has been taken in seve- 
ral tropical seas, and when living, it is said to be as transparent 
as crystal, except its eyes, which are sky-blue. 

The subsequent Orders of the Crustaceans, called by the 
general name of Malacostracans^ are distinguished from the 
preceding by having sessile eyes, imbedded in the substance 
of the head, and though they contain many singular creatures, 
we know little of their habits and history. 

Many of the animals belonging to Latreille's LcBmodipods, or 
throat-footed Crustaceans, which begin the sessile-eyed tribes, 
have very slender bodies, and their legs are separated by a 
considerable interval, like those of geometric larves or loopers 
amongst insects, whose motions they also imitate. One re- 
markable creature is included in this Order, which is parasitic 
upon the whale,^ and by its hooked claws is enabled to main- 
tain its station amidst the fluctuations of the waves. Thi:» 
animal, like the king-crab, has both compound and simple eyes. 

Next to these succeed the Order of Jlmphipods, including a 
number of genera, consisting usually of minute animals; many 
of them, like tl^ grass-hoppers, and several other insects, are 
gifted by their Maker with the faculty of leaping. When one 
meets with a heap of sea-weeds upon the beach, recently left by 
the tide, if we turn it over we shall often see under it myriad* 
of little animals belonging to this Order, jumping about in 
all directions, which are thus enabled, either to find shelter 
under another mass of moist sea-weed, or perhaps to reach 
their native waves in safety. Whether these Crustaceans, like 
their analogues on shore, feed on vegetable substances, has not 
been ascertained; they are generally found as above stated; 
and there may be herbivorous species amongst the Crustaceans, 
as well as in almost every other class of animals. 

The last Crustacean Order is called by Latreille, Isopodsy 
from their legs being usually of the same length ; though a 
large proportion of these are aquatic animals, yet the Order 
terminates in those that are terrestrial. Several of the former 
are furnished with one or more pair of didactyle legs, but the 
terrestrial ones never have these prehensory organs. 

1 Pi-ATF, X. Fig. 3. P. hremcornc? 

2 Vhasma. 3 StoU. Spcctr. t. x\.f. 4'J. 4 Ci/ainiis Celt- 



CRUSTACEAN CONDYLOPES. 221 

Amongst the Crustaceans, Latreille has included the Trilo- 
bites, a remarkable tribe of animals, at present found only in a 
fossil state, and like the chitons, certain wood-lice,^ and the 
armadillo,^ rolling tiiernselves up in a ball. They may form 
part of a branch connecting thei Crustaceans and Molluscans, 
but I leave the discussion of this point to abler hands. 

Thus have we at length arrived at animals, the majority of 
which are terrestrial, at least in their perfect state, for many 
terrestrial Condylopes have aquatic larves and pupes, but few, 
or none, I believe, inhabit salt water, except perhaps some 
species of bugs.^ 

The great Crustacean host, of which probably we do not 
know half the species, is certainly a most valuable gift to man- 
kind, as well as to the various inhabitants or frequenters of 
the waters, especially of the ocean, varying as they do in size, 
from the great thorny lobster to the minute tribes of Entomos- 
tracans ; they probably become the prey of many sea animals, 
besides the Cephalopods, which are stated to make such havoc 
among them.* When we further consider their powers of in- 
finite multiplication, we see that however great the consumption 
of them, there appears no diminution of their numbers, so that 
one kind of animals, by the will of Him who created all things, 
and who gave a law to each species, which regulated their 
numbers, and the momentum of their action, doing or suffer- 
ing, is made to compensate for another, and the law of preser- 
vation to act as an equipoise to the law of destruction. 

When we look, however, at these animals, especially the 
larger kinds, and survey their offensive organs and weapons, 
and the coat of mail that defends them, we feel convinced 
that they also are employed to keep down the numbers of other 
inhabitants of the ocean, more especially as the great body of 
them are evidently predaceous : and this, on such a survey, 
seems tons their primary function. God numbers and weighs 
them both with those they destroy and those that destroy them ; 
his bridle is in their mouth, and they go as far as he permits 
them : and when he gives the word — Peace, be still — the mu- 
tual conflict relaxes, or, in some parts, is intermitted, till the 
general welfare calls for its revival. 

It may be observed with regard to this constant scene of 
destruction, this never universally intermitted war of one part 
of the creation upon another, that the sacrifice of a part main- 

1 Armadillo vulgaris. 2 Dasypus. 

3 Salda Zostarm. F. &c. 4 See above, p. 168, 



222 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

tains the health and life of the whole; the great doctrine of 
vicarious suffering forms an article of physical science ; and we 
discover, standing even upon this basis, that the sufferings 
and death of one being may be, in the Divine counsels, and 
consistently with what we know of the general operations of 
Providence, the cause and instrument of the spiritual life and 
final salvation of infinite hosts of others. Thus does the animal 
kingdom, in some sort, preach the Gospel of Christ. 



CHAPTER XVI. 



Functions and Instincts. Myriapod Condylopes. 

There are two Classes of Condylopes, extremly dissimilar in 
iheir external form and the number of their legs, and yet in 
some respects related to each other, at each of which we may 
be said now to have arrived; both are almost exclusively ter- 
restrial, and both remarkable for their ferocious aspect ; the 
one the analogue of the crab, and the other apparently related 
to the Isopod Crustaceans, the oniscus and armadillo. It will 
be easily seen that I am speaking of the *Rrachnidans and My- 
riapods. 

Regarding, therefore, the long-tailed Decapod Crustaceans 
as leading, by the Order of Isopods which we last considered, 
towards the JMyriapods, and the short-tailed ones or crabs, as 
tending towards the Jlrachnidans, I shall give a brief account 
of the former of these Classes in the present chapter, and I am 
the more induced to assign them precedency because of their 
evident connection with certain Annelidans, which indeed Aris- 
totle, and other ancient Naturalists, thought was so close, that 
they considered them as belonging to the same genus,* and it 
is worthy of remark that, in the Class just named, the repre- 
sentatives, if they may be so called, of the Myriapods, are, like 
them, divided into two tribes, one with a cylindrical and the 
other with aflat body.^ 

The Myriapods exhibit the following general characters. 

Animal undergoing a metamorphosis by acquiring in its pro- 
gress from the egg to the adult state several additional seg- 
ments and legs. Body without wings, divided into numerous 
pedigerous segments, with no distinction of trunk and abdomen. 
Head with a pair of antennae; two compound eyes; a pair of 
mandibles; under-lip connate with the maxillae. 

The class naturally divides itself into two Orders, distin- 
guished both by their form and habits. 

1 Aristot. Hist. .Animal. 1. ii. c. 14. Plin. Hist. Mat. 1. ix. c. 43. 

2 See p. 187. and Plate VIII. Fig. 1. 4. 



224 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

1. Chilognathans.^ Body generally cylindrical; segments 
half membranaceous and half crustaceous, each half bearing 
a pair of legs; antennce seven-jointed, filiform, often a little 
thicker towards the end. These are called Millipedes. Ju- 
lus L. 

2. Chilopodans.^ J5o(/t/ depressed ; segments covered by a 
coriaceous plate, bearing each only a single pair of legs ; an- 
tennce of fourteen or more joints, setaceous. These are called 
Centipedes. Scolopendra L, 

1. Very little is known with respect to the habits and in- 
stincts of the animals belonging to either of these Orders, ex- 
cept that they frequent close and dark places, being usually 
found under stones, under bark, in moss, and the like. 

Latreille names the three families into which he divides the 
first of them, Oniscifonn, Aguiform, and Penidllate ; one^ re- 
sembles a wood-louse, like the mammalian armadillo, the trilo- 
bites, and chitons, when alarmed, rolls itself up into a spheri- 
cal ball ; besides the ordinary dorsal and ventral segments, 
these have, on each side underneath, between the lateral mar- 
gin and the legs, a series of rounded plates, which Latreille 
conjectures may be related to the organs of respiration, which 
seems to give them some further affinity to the Trilobites. 
They are found mostly under stones, and creep out before rain. 

Another,* in itscyhndrical body, gliding motion, and coiling 
itself up spirally, presents a striking resemblance to a snake. 
Some species^ emit, through pores, that have been mistaken 
for spiracles, a strong and rather unpleasant odour. 

The penidllate family, of which only a single species is 
known,® is remarkable for several pencils or tufts of long and 
short scales, which distinguish the sides of the body. These 
are found principally under the bark of trees. 

The myriapods belonging to this order De Geer describes as 
very harmless animals. They appear to feed upon decaying 
vegetable or animal matter. The author just named thinks 
that the common Julus,'^ or Gaily worm, feeds upon earth ; one 
that he kept devoured a considerable portion of the pupe of a 
fly^; other species are stated to eat strawberries and endive ; and 
Frisch fed one, that he kept a long time, upon sugar. 

1 Chilognatha, so called because their lip is formed of the jaws, from Gr. 
^i/\of, a lip, and yvetQoc, a jaw. 

2 Chilojwda, so called because their lip is formed of the foot, from Gr. 
;:^«Xoc, a lip, and ttk?, a foot. 

3 Glomeris. 4 Jul us, &c. 

5 J . foRtidissimus . t> PoUyzenvs lag^unis. 

7 J. terrestris. 



MYRIAPOD C0NDYL0PE9. 225 

3. The Chilopodans or Centipedes, which constitute ihe 
second order, Latreille divides into two families, which he de- 
nominates Incequipedes and ^quipedes. The Incequipedes, so 
called because the six last pairs of lej^s are suddenly longer than 
the rest, belong, as at present known, to a single genus,* which 
being less depressed than the other Centipedes, seems to con- 
nect the two Orders. They are not found in England, but in 
France they are stated to frequent houses and outbuildings, 
where they conceal themselves during the day, between the 
beams and joists, and sometimes under stones ; but when night 
comes they may be seen running upon the walls, with great 
velocity, coursing their prey, which consists of insects, wood- 
hce, and other minute creatures ; these they puncture with 
their oral fangs, and the venom they instill acts very quickly, 
thus enabling them easily to secure their victim. 

The JEquipedes^ so called because all their legs, except the 
last pair, are nearly equal in length, are subdivided into seve- 
ral genera, the most remarkable of which is distinguished by 
the ancient name of Scolopendra. Some species of this genus 
grow to an enormous size ; a specimen of the giant centipede" 
in the British Museum is more than a foot long. The arms 
of the animals of the present Order are more tremendous than 
those of the Millipedes, for their second pair of legs terminates 
in a strong claw,^ which is pierced at the apex for the emission 
of poison ; in this family the first or hip-joints of these legs are 
united and dilated so as to form a lip.* In warm climates, the 
centipedes are said to be very venomous. 

As the anguiform Chilognathans represent the living and 
moving serpent, so the family I am now considering, the equi- 
pede Chilopodans, may be regarded as representing the skele- 
ton of a dead one. The head, with its poison fangs, the de- 
pressed body, formed of segments representing vertebral joints, 
and the legs curving inwards, and resembhng ribs, all concur 
to excite the above idea in the mind of the beholder. 

Like the last family, these also frequent close places, and 
sometimes creep into beds ; they devour insects, and similar 
small animals, which Latreille found the puncture of their 
envenomed fangs arrested, and killed instantaneously ; and it 
is sometimes attended with serious inconveniences to man 
himself. One species,^ in some parts of the West Indies, goes 
by the name of the Mischievous ;^ and the pain caused by the 

1 Cermatia. lllig. Leach. Scutigera. Lam. Latr. 

2 Sc. Gigas. 3 Introd. to Ent. t. vii./. 13. a. 

4 Introd. to Ent. PL vii./. 11. d. b. 

5 Scolopendra morsitans. 6 Malfaisante. 

DD 



226 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

bite of the Giant Centipede, though it is never mortal, is greater 
than that produced by the sting of the scorpion. 

Some centipedes emit a phosphoric light ; of this description 
is one distinguished by the name of the phosphoric,^ which is 
stated by Linne to have fallen from the air upon Captain 
Ekeberg's vessel in the Indian Ocean, a hundred miles from 
land. But the Hght-giving centipede best known is the elec- 
tricy^ which is remarkable for emitting a vivid phosphoric light 
in the dark ; this is produced by a viscid secretion, which, as I 
have observed, when adhering to the fingers, gives hght inde- 
pendent of the animal. This species also frequents beds. Its 
object in this may, perhaps, be to search for bugs and other in- 
sects that annoy our species during repose. 

The function which the Creator has devolved upon the 
Myriapods of the first Order, seems to be that of removing 
putrescent vegetable and animal matter from the spots that they 
frequent ; and that of the second to keep within due limits the 
minor inhabitants, especially the insect, of the dark places of 
the earth. Viewed in this light, however disgusting they may 
seem to us in their general aspect, we may regard them as 
beneficial, and as contributing their eflforts to maintain in order 
and beauty the globe we inhabit. 

It is worthy of remark that the great Hebrew Legislator, 
amongst the unclean animals which it was unlawful for the 
Israelites to eat or to touch, enumerates those which multiply 
feet.^ In the common version it is translated. Hath more feet ; 
but the marginal reading is nearest to the Hebrew, and seems 
to allude to a circumstance upon which I shall hereafter on- 
large, namely, that these animals increase the number of their 
legs with their growth. As a subject intimately connected 
with Zoology in general, and leading to a very profitable study 
of the animal kingdom in a moral point of view, it will not be 
foreign to the object of the present treatise if I add here a few 
remarks upon the distinction of animals into clean and unclean, 
observable in many parts of Holy Writ. This distinction was ori- 
ginally to indicate those which might or might not be olYered 
up in sacrifice, and, afterwards, when animal food was per- 
mitted, to signify to the Jews those that might and those that 
might not be eaten. When Noah was commanded. Of every 
clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sei^ens, the male and his fe- 
male ; and of beasts that are not clean, by two, the male and his 

I S. phosji/iorca. 2 Gcojj/tilus ikclricu^\ ^ l,int.\i Vi 



MYRIAPOD CONDYLOPES. 227 

female^ — it is evident that the distinction was familiar to the 
Patriarch. The unclean animals, with respect to their habits 
and food, belonged to two great classes, namely Zoophagous 
animals, or those which attack and devour living animals; and 
J^ecrophagous animals, or those which devour dead ones, or 
any other putrescent substances. Of the first description are 
the canine'^ and feline^ tribes amongst quadrupeds ; the eagles* 
and hawks^ amongst birds; the crocodiles^ and serpents'^ amongst 
reptiles; the sharks^ Viud pikes'-^ amongst fishes ; the tiger-beetles^'^ 
and ground-beetles^^ amongst insects ; and to name no more, the 
centipedes in the class we are treating of. 

With regard to the necrophagous tribe, I do not recollect any 
mammalians that are exclusively of that description, for the 
hycena^^ and glutton'^^ are ferocious, and eagerly pursue their 
prey, they will, however, devour any carcasses they meet with, 
and even disinter them when buried ; but the vulture amongst 
the birds will not attack the living when he can gorge him- 
self with the dead ; the carrion crow belongs also to this tribe ; 
amongst insects, the burying,^* carrion,'^^ and dissecting beetles,^^ 
the flesh-fly, and many other two-winged flies, feed upon putres- 
cent flesh; and numberless others satiate themselves with all 
unclean and putrid substances, whether animal or vegetable. 
In the present class, the millipedes belong to the necrophagous 
tribe. 

A third description of animals, appearing to be intermediate 
between the clean and unclean, and partaking of the charac- 
ters of both, was added to the list — for instance, those that are 
ruminant and do not divide the hoof, as the camel, which, though 
it has separate toes, they are included in an undivided skin ; 
and those that divide the hoof, but are not ruminant, as the 
swine. 

It appears clear from St Peter's vision, recorded in the Acts 
of the Apostles,^^ that these unclean animals w^ere symbolical, 
and in that particular case represented the Gentile world with 
whom it was not lawful for the Jews to eat or associate,*^ doubt- 
less, lest they should be corrupted in their morals or faith, and 
seduced into Idolatry, and its natural consequences, with re- 
gard to morality, by them. In other passages of Scripture, 



1 


Genes, vii. 2. 


2 


Canis. 3 


Felis. 


4 


Aquila. 


5 


Falco. 6 


Sauria 


7 


Ophidia. 


8 


Squaltis. 9 


Esox. 


10 


Cicindela. 


11 


Carabus, HarpaluSj &c. 




12 


Cards Hycena, L. 


13 


JVecrophorus. 14 


Silpha. 


15 


Dermestes. 


16 


Sarcophaga carnaria. 




17 


^cts, X. 10—15 


18 


Ibid. ver. 28. 





228 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

unclean animals are employed to s3^mbolize evil and unclean 
spirits as well as men, as the serpent, the dragon, or crocodile,* 
the lion,^ and the scorpion.^ 

By way of corollary to the present short chapter, I shall de- 
vote a few pages to a very interesting subject, intimately con- 
nected with the animals whose history and habits I have just 
described, and which marks out the plan upon which the wis- 
dom, power, and goodness of the Creator have been manifested 
in animal structures. I allude to what has been named the 
conversion of organs, by which term is meant, not only in par- 
ticular instances, multiplying the functions of any given organ, 
as, for instance, when the tail of an animal is employed like a 
handy to take hold of the branch of a tree, and to assist in loco- 
motion, as in the chameleon, and certain monkeys;* and the 
tongue is also made to subserve to prehension, as in the case 
of the giraffe; but likewise when the organ is converted from 
one use to another, as when the anterior leg is taken from lo- 
comotion, and given to prehension, as the human hand ; or as 
when all the ordinary organs of locomotion in one tribe are in 
another converted into oral organs, either to assist in mastica- 
tion, or to discharge the office of a lip, as in the Crustaceans 
and centipedes. In the investigation of this curious and inte- 
resting subject, the class of Myriapods affords an example, if I 
may so speak, of the gradual conversion of locomotive organs 
into auxiliary oral ones. Something of this kind I have be- 
fore stated,^ is discoverable in certain Annelidans, either related 
to those animals or their analogues. 

- In the Introduction to Entomology it is observed, with respect 
to the larves of many Hexapod Condylopes, that their progress 
towards what is called their perfect state, is by losing their spu- 
rious legs or prolegs, and by acquiring organs of flight; whereas 
in the Myriapods, the reverse of this takes place ; instead of 
losing legs and shortening their body, some of them when first 
hatched, have only six legs, representing the six legs of Hexa- 
pods, and all in their progress to their adult state acquire a 
large number of what may be denominated spurious legs, which 
support many additional segments. 

As the ChilognathanSf in their young state, come nearest to 
the insect or hexapod tribes, I shall begin by stating the changes 
they undergo. In the most common species,'' according to 
De Geer's description and figure, the animal is divided into 

1 Revel. XX. 2. 2 1 Pet. v. 8. 3 Luke, x. 10. 

4 .^telc^t. 5 See above, p. 186. 

6 Julus trrrcstris. 



MYRIAPOD CONDYLOPES. 

three principal parts, as in Hexapods ; first, there is a head 
with antennse, and the usual oral organs, thousfh a httle aber- 
rant in their structure ; next, there is a trunk, consisting of 
three segments, each bearing a pair of legs ; and lastly, there 
is an abdomen, divided into five segments, without legs.* With 
regard to their oral organs, they correspond with those of Hex- 
apods, both in number and kind, for in the moutii, above is a 
representative of the upper-lip; below this is a pair of mandi- 
bles or upper-jaws; next follows a lower-lip, consisting of three 
pieces united together, the two lateral ones analogous both to 
the lower-jaws of Hexapods, and the first pair of maxillae of 
Crustaceans; and the intermediate one, resolvable into two 
pieces, representing the lip of the former and the second pair 
of maxillae, according to Savigny, of the latter, from his figures,* 
the maxillary and labial feelers appear to have their represen- 
tatives ; yet though he has figured he does not notice them as 
feelers.^ 

The six original or natural legs of the lulus are its first 
organs of locomotion, which when the animal is arrived at its 
complete development, as to number of legs and segments, — 
are said still to maintain their original function, although pro- 
bably diminished in energy; the two first pairs are, however, 
as it were, applied to the mouth, the segments that bear them 
being very short. The sciatic joint or hip* of the first pair 
forms a single piece; those of the second are also united and 
more elevated ; but those of the third are distinct : so that in 
this Order of the Myriapods we see the first tendenc}^ towards 
employing what in Hexapods wear the form and perform the 
functions of legs as auxiliaries of the mouth, and of the locomo- 
tive function being devolved upon organs which have no repre- 
sentative in Hexapods, except in their incipient state. 

To proceed next to the Chilopodans — it has not yet been 
ascertained what changes they undergo in the progress of their 
growth, save that the number of legs and segments increases 
till they have arrived at their full size,^ nor is it known how 
many they have when first hatched, but, from their structure, 
it seems evident that the analogues of the two first pair of legs 
of the Chilognathans, can never be employed in locomotion ; 
and further, that not only is their first or hip-joint united with 



1 De Geer, vii. 583. t xxxvi./. 20, 21. 

2 ^nim. saiis Vertebr. Mem. ii. t.f. 1. o. 2. o. 

3 He says that the pieces forming the labium are D'enuees des palpes. 
Ibid. p. 44. 

4 Cox(B. 5 De Geer, vii. 562. 



230 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

its fellow, so as to form a kind of auxiliary lip, but the other 
articulations are converted into prehensory organs, instead of 
a locomotive one, in the first pair armed at the end with a 
minute forceps, and in the second with a fang resembling the 
tooth of a serpent, having a pore at the extremity for the emis- 
sion of poison, connected with an loierium or poison bag. 

Here then, in these two Orders of the Myriapods, we have a 
regular coM^emon of organs: those that in the Millipedes are 
used for locomotion, in the Centipedes, exchange that function 
for that of prehension, both agreeing in being auxiliary, at their 
base, to mastication, but the latter with a greater momentum. 

The reason of this change in the functions of these organs 
we shall readily see when we consider the habits and food of 
these respective Orders. The Chilognathans deriving in gene- 
ral their nutriment from putrescent substances whether animal 
or vegetable, have no resistance to overcome, and therefore 
require not the aid of additional prehensory organs to enable 
them to execute their offices ; while the Chilopodans, having 
to contend with living animals, must put them hors de combat, 
either by killing them, or deadening their efforts, before they 
can devour them. In this last Order we find that though the 
two first pairs of legs have a new office, the third pair are still 
used for locomotion. 

From the oral organs and their auxiliaries of the Myriapods 
to those of the Crustaceans, the interval is not very wide ; and 
amongst the latter the Isopods, especially the terrestrial ones, as 
might be expected, approach the nearest to them. De Geer 
observes that the common wood-louse,^ which in its adult state 
has fourteen legs ; when it first leaves the egg, has only six 
pairs and six segments;^ thus doubling the number of the 
Hexapods and Julus ; and in this animal and its relation, Lipa, 
the thoracic legs are all used in locomotion; but when we ex- 
amine the aquatic, especially the marine, genera of this Order, 
as Idotea, Stenosoma, &c., we find that the first pair of thoracic 
legs is taken from that function, and made auxiliary to the 
organs of the mouth. 

Leaving the Isopods, if we go to the Decapods, amongst those 
with a long tail,^ which from their cylindrical form and other 
circumstances, are nearer to the Chilognathan Myriapods than 
to the Chilopodan, taking the lobster for our type, we find the 
organs analogous to the six legs of Hexapods, exhibiting a 
new character : for from the outer side of their basal joint issues 

1 OniscusAsdhis. 2 vii. 551. 3 Matronri. 



MYRIAPOD CONDYLOPES. 231 

an organ which is peculiar to these legs. The organ I allude 
to is called, by M. Savigny, a flagrum or whip ; and, by M. 
Latreille, a flagelliform palpus or feeler ; it usually consists of 
two parts, an elongated exarticulate base, representing the 
handle o(i[\e whip; and an annulated or jointed part generally 
forming an angle with it, representing the lash: the mandibles 
also have feelers of the usual structure. The organs above 
alluded to, show that all the representatives of the legs of 
Hexapods in the lobster, are converted to a new function — 
whether precisely analogous to that of feelers is not clear. 

In the lobster the basal joints of the first pair of maxillary 
legs are dilated, and the wliole organ may be regarded as 
maxilliform; but in the second it is palpiform, and in the third 
it resumes the joints and appearance of a crustaceous leg, and 
is densely ciliated, which seems to indicate that it is used in 
swimming. 

In the common crab,^ amongst the short-tail Decapods,^ the 
legs in question seem all taken from locomotion, and the second 
pair does not differ from those of the lobster; but the last, 
though consisting of the same number of joints, is very differ- 
ent, the two intermediate joints being dilated, and the two legs 
together forming as it were a pair of folding-doors, which close 
the mouth externally, the three last joints resembling those of 
the legs. These animals, therefore, in some sort, the flatness 
of their body and this double auxiliary lip considered, present 
the same analogy to the Chilopodan Myriapods, that the lobster 
does to the Chilognathan. In both we see, by their feelers, 
there is a further conversion of these organs into instruments 
connected with the mouth; so as to bring them nearer to the 
nature and use of maxillae or under jaws, and of a labium or 
under-hp. 

It appears from the experiments and observations of Rathke^ 
that the long-tailed Decapod Crustaceans do not change the 
form, or increase the number of locomotive organs, that distin- 
guish them when they issue from the egg* Once residing a 
few weeks on the northern coast of Norfolk, where the sea, at 
low w^ater, retires to a considerable distance from the high 
water mark, I had an opportunity of witnessing the proceedings 
of a species of crab very common there,^ and varying greatly in 

1 Cancer Pagurus. 2 Brachyuri. 

3 Recherches sur le developement dcs Ecrevisses. Abstract of Jinn, des 
Sc. JYat. 2rix. 442. 4 Ibid. 463. 

5 Cancer Mannas. L, Mr Westwood, in a letter received since this went 
to press, expresses his conviction that Crustaceans do not undergo any meta- 
morphosis. Besides a variety of other arguments which he will himself bring 



232 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

size, some, if my memory does not deceive me, scarcely exceed- 
ing- the size of a pea, others being three or four inches in 
diameter, and all exactly corresponding in every particular; so 
that it seems probable that the short-tailed tribe also undergo 
no change* except of size, though, as we have seen above, the 
terrestrial Isopods acquire additional legs in their progress to 
maturity. The legs, however, of these Crustaceans cannot be 
regarded as analogues of the legs of Hexapods, but rather of the 
acquired legs of the Myriapods. 

In order to form a clear notion of the object of Providence in 
thus, as it were, taking certain organs from locomotion, and 
forming a new set for that purpose, and multiplying those con- 
nected with the seizing and mastication of the food of the 
animals in which this metamorphosis takes place, it would be 
necessary to watch their proceedings in their native element, 
the water, to ascertain the nature of their food, their mode of 
taking it, and other circumstances connected with its conversion 
into a pulp proper for digestion; but as few can have an 
opportunity of doing this, we can only conjecture that this 
multiplicity of organs is rendered necessary by the circumstan- 
ces in which they are placed, and the element they inhabit; 
for, as we have seen, no such conversion occurs in the terrestrial 
Crustaceans; probably the denser medium requires a more 
complex structure and more powerful action in the instruments 
connected with the nutriment of the animal. 

Having considered these instances of the legs of Hexapods 
being, as it were, metamorphosed into organs more especially 
connected with nutrition, I shall next mention, more briefly, 
some cases in which the oral organs themselves are modified 
to discharge other functions than what is usually their primary 
one. 

To begin with the Arachnidans or spiders. In these the two- 
jointed mandibles or cheliceres, as Latreille calls them, are not 
organs of mastication solely; for though, from the vast strength 
and power of the first joint audits flat internal surface, we may 
conjecture that it assists in pressing the juices out of their prey, 
yet at the extremity of the second is a poison fang, being fur- 
nished, like the tooth of a viper or centipede, witli a pore for 
emitting venom, which though not easily discovered in the 
smaller species, is visible under a lens in the larger; with these 

forward in duo time, he lately met with younir specimens of this crab at Con- 
way, in N. Wales, only 1-lG of an inch in lcn<;tli, which did not ditlVr t'ro'.w 
adult ones. 



MYRIAPOD CONDYLOPES. 233 

fangs, which communicate with a poison vesicle, the spider 
dispatches the insects struggling in his toils, which otherwise 
he could not so easily master, and having sucked out their 
juices casts away the carcass. The fang, by folding upon the 
apex of the basal joint of the organ we are considering, 
which is toothed on each side, and has a channel to receive it 
when unemployed, can be formed into a forceps, resembling 
that which arms the anterior thoracic leg of the shrimp, or that 
of the mantis, and which is probably, in some circumstances, 
used for prehension. 

The subject of poison-fangs affords a striking example of the 
adaptation and modification of different parts and organs to the 
discharge of the same or similar functions, according to the cir- 
cumstances in which an animal is placed; the viper, the centi- 
pede, and the spider have their sting in their moutli, or in its 
vicinity; the scorpion and the bee and wasp have it at the other 
extremity of the body; while the male of the Ornithorhynchus, 
or Duck-bill, and Echidna, or New Holland Porcupine, have it 
in their hind legs. Considering the evident affinity between 
these last animals and ihoArirds, their poison-spur seems evi- 
dently analogous to ttfe spur that distinguishes the males of 
many gallinaceous birds ; and, reasoning from analogy, we 
may conclude that this organ is given to the males of the Mo- 
notremes as a weapon to be used in their mutual combats. 

Whoever examines the underside of a spider will find the 
feelers and the eight legs arranged nearly in a circle, with their 
first hip-joints parallel; with some this joint in the feelers is 
dilated, but in others it is of the same shape with the analo- 
gous joint of the legs, only a little longer. It forms the maxilla 
or under-jaw, and between the first pair is the under-hp. The 
function of the maxillae is to assist the, so called, mandibles, in 
pressing out the juices of the flies and other insects submitted 
to their action, and the analogous and parallel joints in the 
eight legs add some momentum to it. 

The Palpi, or feelers — which in some cases emerge from 
the side of the maxilla, and appear a distinct organ, and in 
others are merely a continuation of it — in one sex undergo a 
singular conversion, and discharge a function connected with 
reproduction ; and in the other, the female, are said sometimes 
to assist in supporting the egg pouch, which many of these 
creatures carry about with them, and guard with maternal 
solicitude. 

It has been made a question by physiologists what the man- 
dibles, and maxillae with their palpi, of the Arachnidans really 
represent ; whether they are the analogues of organs bearing 

EE 



234 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

the same name in Hexapod Condylopes, or of others to be 
found in the Crustaceans or Myriapods. Latreille, in his latest 
work, regards the pieces immediately following the upper lip 
as analogues of the same parts in the Crustaceans, namely, a 
pair of palpigerous mandibles, two pairs of pediform maxillae, 
and two pairs also of maxillary feet, analogous to the four an- 
terior feet of insects/ Of the above organs, the mandibles 
and two pairs of maxillae may be regarded as having their pro- 
totype in the Hexapods ; for the second pair of maxillae of the 
Crustaceans, in the Chilognathans, is the piece that represents 
the labium, or under-hp, of the first named animals. 

Savigny, however, is of opinion that the auxiliary maxillcB, 
or, according to Latreille, maxillary feet, of the crab, except 
the first pair, become the mandibles and maccilloe, of the spider; 
and that the thoracic legs of the same animal, with the same 
exception, become also its ambulatory legs :^ thus accounting 
for the reduction of the number of the latter from ten to eight, 
perhaps he was induced to adopt this opinion, with respect to 
the oral organs, by considering the mandibles of the spider as 
analogous to the poison-fang which arms the second pair of 
auxiliary feet of the Scolopendra. 

I feel, however, rather inclined to adopt the opinion of the 
former learned entomologist, from the consideration of an Arach- 
nidan, which seems evidently to lead towards the Hexapods. 
The animal I allude to is one of ancient fame, of which, once 
for all, I shall here give the history. 

^lian relates that a certain district of ^Ethiopia was desert- 
ed by its inhabitants in consequence of the appearance of in- 
credible numbers of scorpions, and of those Phalangians which 
are denominated Tetragnatha, or having four jaws. An event 
mentioned also by Diodorus Siculus and Strabo.^ Pliny like- 
wise alludes to this event, but calls the last animal Solpuga,* a 
name which, in another place,* he says was used by Cicero to 
designate a venomous kind of ant. 

The epithet Tetragnatha, applied by .^lian, &c. to the ani- 
mal which, in conjunction with the scorpion, expelled the 
^Ethiopians, as just slated, from the district they inhabited, 
seems clearly to point to the Solpuga of Fabricius, for any per- 

1 Latr. Cours D'Entomologie, 167. 

2 j3nm. sans Vcrtehr. ii. 57, Note a. 

3 Bochart. Hierozdic. ii. 1. iv. c. 13. 

4 Hist. JVat. 1. viii. c. 29. This name seems derived from the (»reek, He 
liocentris. 

5 L. xxix. c. 4 



MYRIAFOD CONDYLOPES. 235 

son, not skilled in natural science, would, when lie saw the ex- 
panded forceps of their mandible, pronounce that they had 
four jaws;* and the animals of this genus, in their general form 
and aspect, exhibit no small resemblance to an ant, so that it is 
not wonderful that Pliny should regard them as a kind of veno- 
mous ant. It seems, therefore, almost certain that the ancient 
and modern Solpuga are synonymous. Pliny, indeed, men- 
tions a certain kind of spider — one of which he describes as 
weaving very ample webs — under the name Tetragnathii ; but 
these appear to have no connection with the Phalangia tetrag- 
natha of ^lian, &c. 

Olivier was the first modern naturalist who described the 
animals now before us, to which he gave the generic appella- 
tion of Galeodes ; but if, as the above circumstances render very 
probable, they are really synonymous with the ancient Solpuga, 
that name, revived by Fabricius, should be retained. 

Whether these animals are really as venomous and malefi- 
cent as they were said to be of old, and as their terrific aspect 
may be thought to announce, seems very doubtful. We learn 
from Olivier that the Arabs still regard their bite as mortal, and 
that the same opinion obtains in Persia and Egypt; and Pal- 
las relates several facts, which, he says, he witnessed himself, 
which appear to prove that, unless timely remedies are applied, 
they instil a deadly venom into those they bite. Oil is stated 
to be the best application. On the other hand, Olivier, who 
found these Arachnidans common in Persia, Mesopotamia, and 
Arabia, affirms that every night they ran over him, when in 
bed, with great velocity, without ever stopping to annoy him ; 
no one was bitten by them, nor could he collect a single well- 
attested fact to prove that their bite was so dangerous : to judge 
by the strong pincers with which the mouth is armed, he 
thought it might be painful, but he doubts whether it is ac- 
companied by any infusion of venom. The manibles have 
clearly no fang with a poison-pore, like those of the spiders. 

To return from this digression. I principally mentioned this 
tribe of animals, because, as was long ago observed by Walck- 
enaer,^ and the observation was repeated by L. Dufour,^ the 
head, in them, is distinct from the trunk ; and, as well as Phry- 
nus and Thelyphonus, it has only six thoracic legs : so that, as 
the latter writer remarks, though its physiognomy and man- 
ners arrange it naturally with the Arachnidans, these charac- 
ters exclude it from them.-* Latreille, indeed, seems to regard 

1 L. Dufour. Jinnal. Gener. des Sc. JVat. iv. t. Ixiv. f. 7, a. 

2 Tableau des Araneid. 1. 3 Ubi supr. 18. 4 Ibid. 20 



236 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

the head and trunk of this animal as not distincf, but as form- 
ing together what he names a cephalothorax, or headthorax ; 
yet he admits that the ihree last pairs of legs aie attached to 
as many segments of the trunk,^ which certainly infers the 
separation above alluded to. 

Savigny says, with respect to the feelers of Solpuga, that 
they, and the two anterior legs, so closely resemble each other, 
that they may either be called feelers or legs ; but in the species 
described by L. Dufour,^ and another in my cabinet,' this is 
not altogether the case, for the feelers, though pediform, are 
not terminated by a claw, but by a membranous vesicle, from 
which issues, when the animal is irritated, an apparatus pro- 
bably used as a sucker, and which gives them a prehensory 
function ; while the organs that represent the anterior pair of 
legs of the other Arachnidans, at the base of their maxillary or 
sciatic joint, are soldered, as it were, to the corresponding joint 
of the feelers, with which they agree in the number and kind 
of their articulations, except that they do not protrude a sucker ; 
neither are they armed with a claw hke the other legs, but are 
probably simply tentacular, or exploratory. There seems no 
slight analogy between these united maxillae and what Savigny 
denominates the first and second pair of muxillae of (he mille- 
pedes, also united, which appear to me to represent the lower- 
lip and maxillae of the hexapods, and in this case the two pair 
of feelers that issue from the coxo-maxillae, as they are some- 
times called, or sciatic joints in the Solpuga, may be regarded 
as representing the labial and maxillary feelers of the hexapods; 
the second pair are also analogous, boih in their place and 
their function, to the first pair, or tentacular legs of Thelypko- 
nus and Phrynus. In the Solpuga, the labium, or under-lip, of 
the spiders, is represented by a bilobed organ, which Savigny 
calls a sternal tongue. 

From the consideration of this animal we seem to have ob- 
tained the elements, or type, in reference to which the oral, 
prehensory, and locomotive organs of the Arachnidans were 
iformed; that their mandibles, maxillae, and feelers ; their second 
maxillae, and the, so called, anterior legs emerging from them, 
are analogous to the mandibles, labium and labial feelers, and 
maxillae and maxillary feelers of the hexapods ; and the remain- 
ing three pairs of legs, of their six legs; the sternal tongue, so 
called by Savigny because it is a process of the sternum, will 
thus be an organ sui generis, unless it may be regarded as, in 

1 Cows DEiUomolog. 546. *2 Unicodes inttepidus. 

3 SolpvfraJ'atalis. 



MYIIIAPOD CONDYLOPES. 237 

some sort, the analogue of the prosternum of insects. If this 
view is correct, we have here various conversions, as of maxill(B 
and palpi into legs; a labium into maxillod; and a prosternum 
into a labium. In the Pedipalps — with the exception of the 
scorpions, — e. g. in Thelyphonus and Phrynus, especially the 
latter, the first pair of legs of Octopods seem to wear the form, 
and in some measure to discharge the functions of antenn(Z. 

In the shepherd-spiders^ all the legs, in some degree, imitate 
antennae, especially in their tarsi, which sometimes consist of 
more than fifty joints, rendering them very flexible, so as to 
assume any curve, and fits them, as their long legs do the 
crane-fly,^ to course rapidly over and among the herbage and 
the leaves of shrubs, &c. When reposing upon a wall, or the 
trunk of a tree, this animal arranges its legs so as to form a 
circle as it were of rays around the body, the thigh forming a 
very obtuse angle with the rest of the leg, and so, though the 
body is so small, they occupy a considerable space ; but, if a 
finger, or any insect, &c. touches them, it elevates these angles 
into very acute ones, so as to form a circle of arcades round the 
central nucleus or body, under which any small creature can 
pass, but if this does not succeed, it makes its escape with a 
velocity wonderful for an animal furnished with legs more than 
ten times the length of its body. 

In the scorpion and the book-crab,^ as well as the shepherd- 
spider, the mandibles, which are short, have a movable joint, 
and are converted into a forceps, like the anterior legs of the 
crab or the lobster ; their feelers also, which are very long, 
terminate in the same way, and form an organ by which they 
can catch their prey ; the former being armed besides with a 
long jointed tail, furnished at the end with a sting, which they 
can turn over their back, and thus, either annoy their assail- 
ants, or dispatch any captive whose resistance they cannot 
otherwise easily overcome. 

To what a variety of uses are analogous organs applied in 
the diversified instances here adduced ; and in all these varia- 
tions from a common type, how apparent are the footsteps of 
an intelligent First Cause, taking into consideration the in- 
tended station and functions of every animal, and how the 
structure may be best adapted to them, not only in general,, 
but in every particular organ. 

As far as we can lift up the mystic veil that covers the face 
of nature, by means of observation and experiment, we find 

1 Phalangimn. 2 Tipula. 3 Chdifer, Obisium^ &c. 



238 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

that every iota and tittle of an animal's structure, is with a 
view to some end important to it ; and the Almighty Fabrica- 
tor of the Universe and its inhabitants, when he formed and 
moulded, ex prczjacente materia^ the creatures of his hand, de- 
creed that the sphere of locomotive and sentient beings should 
be drawn together by mutual attraction, and concatenated by 
possessing parts in common, though not always devoted to a 
common use ; thus leading us gradually from one form to an- 
other, till we arrive at the highest and most distinguished of 
the visible creation ; and instructing us by his works, as well 
as by his word, to cultivate peace and union, and to seek the 
good of the community to which we belong ; and, as far as our 
influence goes, of the whole of His creation. 



CHAPTER XVII. 



Motive, locomotivey and prehensory Organs of Animals considered. 

The remarkable circumstances noticed in the last chapter with 
regard to the legs of Crustaceans and Myriapods, and their em- 
ployment in aid of manducation, sheds no small hght upon the 
subject of locomotive organs in general, and their primary 
function; it will therefore not be out of place, if, in the pre- 
sent chapter, I consider those organs, as far as they are exter- 
nal, according to their several types, as exhibited in the entire 
sphere of animals; upon which, indeed, the due accomphsh- 
ment of their various functions, and the exercise of their sev- 
eral instincts — which in most of the succeeding classes assume 
a new and more developed character — mainly depend. This 
is a wide field, but one full of interest, and which, studied as it 
deserves, conspicuously illustrates the higher attributes of the 
Deity. 

We are placed in a world full of motion; of all motions, none 
fall more immediately under our notice than those of the vari- 
ous members of the animal kingdom; and the external organs 
by which they are effected, attract every eye both by their 
infinite diversity, and the adaptation of their individual struc- 
ture to the occasions and wants of the animal in whom the}^ 
are found, so that they may, in the best and safest manner, 
effect such changes of place as are necessary for their purposes. 

Nutrition may be stated as the primary object of the motions 
and locomotions of the members of the animal kingdom in 
general. No sooner is the fostus or embryo so separated from 
its parent stock, as not to imbibe its food from it, than it begins 
to employ instinctively its prehensory and motive organs in 
collecting it. And, whether we descend to the foot of the scale 
of animals, or mount to its summit, we shall find that their — 
Daily Bread — is the principal object that in every Class sets 
the members in motion. 

The motive organs may be divided into two classes, those that 
are employed by an animal in locomotion, and those that are 
used for prehension; but as many of the locomotive organs are 
also prehensive, and prehension is often in aid of locomotion — 



240 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

as in climbing and burrowing — it will not be easy to consider 
the motive organs separately with regard to these functions, 1 
shall therefore consider them generally, according to certain 
types or kinds, under which they maybe arranged, and which 
present themselves very obviously, when, with this view, we 
survey from base to summit, or rather from pole to pole, the 
entire sphere which constitutes the animal kingdom. 

Generally speaking, in this survey, as well as in the peculiar 
motions of the various groups of animals, we have no trouble 
in ascertaining what are the external organs by which the 
Creator has enabled and instructed each animal to accomplish 
them; but there is one anomalous tribe, or, perhaps, it might be 
denominated. Sub-kingdom, in one Class of which, at least, this 
is not so obvious. I allude to Ehrenberg's Tribe of Plant- 
animals,^ particularly his first or polygastric Class,^ in which 
the organs of their various locomotions, enumerated in a former 
part of this work,^ remain unknown, and some, as those that 
have an oscillatory movement, one might almost suspect were 
moved by an external cause. The little Monad, parasitic on 
the eye-worm of the perch,* which alternately spins round like 
a top, and then darts forward Hke an arrow,^ seems as if, like a 
watch, it required to be wound up before it could go. 

Before I confine myself to those motive organs which are 
local and planted in certain parts of the body of an animal, as 
legs, wings, fins, &c., I shall first mention those motions in 
which the whole body is concerned. Of this description is the 
alternate contraction and expansion of some, as the Salpes and 
Pyrosomes and other Tunicaries f the annular motion propa- 
gated from one extremity of the body to the other, as in the 
^arth-worms,'' geometric caterpillars, and many other larves ; 
the undulating movements of the flexile bodies of many aqua- 
tic animals, as fishes, particularly the serpentiform ones ; and 
the gliding motion of serpents themselves over the surface of 
the earth as well as their undulations. Many of the animals 
here alluded to are provided with subsidiary organs — as the 
-earth-worm with lateral bristles ;* the geometric larves, with 
legs at each extremity of their body ; the leech with suckers ; 
which, however, would be of little use without the expansion 
and contraction of its body f and the fishes with fins : but if 

1 Phytozoa. 2 See above, p. 83. a /Z»/V/. 8\i. 

4 Diplostomum volvans. 5 See Appendix. 

6 See p. 120, l'2-J. 7 Jhid.^AM. 8 Ibtd. 

9 //nW. p. 181. 



PREIIENSORV ORGANS. 241 

we considei the form and circumstances of all these animals, 
we shall see, in each case, the design and contrivance of Su- 
preme Wisdom. Without the power of contraction and expan- 
sion, by which the Salpes, Pyrosomes, &c., alternately attract 
and repel the waters which they inhabit, they might indeed, 
from their absorbent structure, be saturated, but nutrition could 
not take place. The earth-worm again, a subterranean ani- 
mal, but which occasionally emerges, by the annular motion 
of its body can much more easily wind its sinuous way with- 
out obstruction when it seeks again its dark abode under the 
earth. The denser medium compared with air, through which 
I he aquatic animals pass, renders greatflexibihtya very import- 
ant quality, to enable them to overcome the resistance it op- 
poses to their progress. 

Having premised these observations on motions produced by 
the action of the whole body, or successively propagated from 
one extremity to the other, I shall now proceed to consider 
those external organs, which are its obvious instruments in the 
great majority of animals, beginning with those that are found 
in the lowest groups. 

1. Rotatory Organs. In some specieg of Infusories, even in 
Ehrenberg's first Family of his Polygastric Class, the oral 
aperture is fringed with a circlet of bristles, but whether the 
animal by their means creates a vortex in the water, or whe- 
ther they are analogous to the tentacles of the polypes, and 
are employed in collecting its food, seems not to have been 
clearly ascertained. Lower down in this Class, and approach- 
ing the Rotatories, we find a singular animal,^ with bristles, 
by their position, simulating legs, which, as was before ob- 
served,^ revolve with wonderful rapidity. But it is in the 
Class of Rotatories that these revolving organs are most con- 
spicuous. They are described as shaped like a tunnel, the 
lube of which terminates in a deep-seated pharynx armed with 
jaws, and the external dilated orifice fringed with fine hairs or 
bristles, to which the animal communicates a very rapid rota- 
tion, whence they are called iv heel- animals. Some, as the vor- 
ticels,^ the wheel-animals by way of eminence, appear to have 



1 Discocepkalus Rotator, Plate 1. A. Fig. 6. 

2 See Appendix. 

3 Vorticella. Miill. They constitute chiefly the Rotifera of Lamarck, and 
are divided by Ehrenberg into numerous genera. His genus Vorticella, the 
type of which is V. convallaria, Miill. is placed in his Polygastric Class, in a 
section of his fourth Family {Anopisthia) , which section he names Vorticel- 
lina. 

FF 



242 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

^wo wheels, oiheis three, or even four: Lamarck is of opinion, from 
the observations of Du Trochet, that what are taken for two or 
more wheels, are only one, bent so as to form partial ones ;* but in 
some they are certainly distinct organs.^ The object of the rapid 
gyration of this wheel or wheels is to create a vortex in the water, 
whose centre is the mouth of the animal, a little charybdis bear- 
ing with it all the animalcules or molecules that come within 
its sphere of action, and by this remarkable mechanism it is 
enabled by its Creator, as long as it is encircled by a fluid me- 
dium, to get a due supply of food. These w^heels are merely 
foraging organs, for on a surface the locomotions of these 
singular animals resemble those of the leech described in an- 
other place.^ 

In surveying the organs by which animals procure their 
food, we are struck by the wonderful diversity and multipli- 
city of means by which the same end is attained, and yet, 
through all this diversity, a series of approximations may be 
traced, proving that the same hand directed by the Wisdom, 
Power, and Love of one and the same Infinite Being fabricated 
the whole host of creatures endowed with powers of voluntary 
motion. What care does it manifest, and attention to the 
welfare of these invisibles, and what contrivance, that they 
should be flitted with an organ, by means of which, when they 
are awakened from a state of suspended animation, and from 
a long fast perhaps of months, or even years, by water coming 
in sufficient contact with them, they can start up into life, and 
by the gyrations of their wheels immediately begin to breathe, 
and to procure a sufficient supply of food for their sustenance, 
while they continue animated. 

2. Tentacles. Nearly related to these bristle-crowned rota- 
tory appendages of the mouth of some animalcules are what 
are named Tentacles, so called probably from their being usu- 
ally exploring organs. In its most restricted sense, this term is 
understood to signify organs, appendages of the mouth, which 
have no articulations,* but, in a larger sense, the term hav^ been 
applied also to all jointed organs in its vicinity, and used for a 
similar purpose, which indeed are the precursors of feelers and 
antenna3. The structure of the flrst-mentioned, or proper ten- 
tacles, and the means by which they perform their motions, 
and fulfil their functions, have been before explained.* It is 
to these organs, as well as for their food, that the polypes arc 

1 Soc iJakrr On the, Microscope, i. !)1. t, viii./. r». 

3 Ihid.f.G. :] Seeiilwv.M). l.-l. 

4 See JSavigny Syst. dcs JJnncUdcs, iii. 4. T) Sro abovi", p. S"^ 



rREIIENSORY ORCJANS. 243 

indebtcfl for wlint constitiitep (heir principal ornament, that re- 
semblance which, though born to bkisli unseen, even in the 
(leptlis of the ocean, their Creator has enabled them to assume, 
of a plant or shrub in full blossom adorned with crimson or 
orange-colonred flowers. 

In \he fixed pol3q:)es, the tentacles are the only motive organs, 
but in those that can shift their quarters, as ilie Hydra,^ they 
move by fixing each extremity like the leech, probably by 
means of something analogous to suckers. As the former, like 
(heir analogues in ihe vegetable kingdom, are fixed by their 
base, and consequently cannot move from place to place in 
search of food, Divine Goodness has compensated this to them, 
and they obtain all the advantages of locomotion by the pro- 
gressive multiplication of their oscula or mouths, each sur- 
rounded by a coronet of tentacles, so that they have, on all 
sides, and at all heights, numberless sets of organs conslantly 
employed in collecting food from the fluid they inhabit; some, 
it is stated, by creating a vortex, like the wheel-animals, and 
the majority, probably, by means of minute suckers, or some 
viscid tentacious secretion. What each individual collects 
does not merely serve for its own nutriment, but also contri- 
butes something to that of the whole community,^ so that 
though some may contribute more to the common stock and 
others less, yet the deficiency of one is made up by the redun- 
dancy of another. 

The tentacles of the fresh-water polypes forming the loco- 
motive genus Hydra, are not, as those of the fixed marine ones, 
shaped like the petals of a blossom, but are long hair-like flexile 
arms, somewhat resembling the branches of a chandelier,^ 
which explore the waters around them, and lay strong hold of 
any small animals or substances they come in contact with,* 
BO that they seem to throw out lines, fitted with hooks, to 
catch their prey. 

Amongst the Radiaries, in the Order of Gelatines,^ tentacles 
exist in some genera and not in others, and, wliere they do 
exist, their functions and situation are not clearly ascertained. 
In the Pelasgic Medusa there are four broad flexible arms, and 
round the margin eight narrow tentacles, as they are called, 
both of which the animal is stated to employ in seizing its 
prey, so that both may be entitled in this view to the denomi- 
nation of tentacles, yet one may be respiratory organs and the 

1 See above, p. 92. 2 Jhid. 91. 

3 Lasser. L. Theologie des Ins I t. it fr. 28—32. 

4 SeeaboTe, pp. 88— 91. 5 Ihid.lQL 



244 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

others merely prehensory.* But the Medusidans vary greatly 
with regard to these organs, some having neither arms nor 
tentacles;^ others having tentacles but no arms;^ others again 
arms but no tentacles;* and lastly, others both these organs.^ 

In the two first sections of the Order of Echimoderms, con- 
sisting of the Stelleridans and Echmidans, the mouth has no 
coronet of tentacles, but, instead, is armed with five pieces, 
which, in the latter particularly, assume the form and function 
of mandibles f but the Fistulidans present again a fioriform 
coronet of tentacles, not simple but expanded, and branching 
at their extremity, with which they seize their prey. In the 
Holothuna, besides these, the mouth is armed with five teeth 
or mandibles. 

Tentacles, but not conspicuously, surround the mouth of only 
some of the Tunicaries, it will therefore be suflicient merely to 
mention them, and proceed to certain oceanic animals amongst 
the Jlnnelidans whom their Creator has adorned, if I may so 
speak, with rays of glory, which, when expanded, surround 
their head, or rather mouth, with a most magnificent coronet. 
The animals I allude to constitute the genus Amphitrite of 
Lamarck, and the Sabella of Savigny ; this coronet, in some 
species, is formed by numerous tentacles, called, by the authors 
just named, Branchicz, or gills; but as they are stated to be 
employed in collecting their food, as well as in respiration,'' 
they seem in this respect perfectly analogous to the tentacles 
of the polypes, and wheels of the rotatories, which are also 
respiratory organs. The great difference seems to consist in 
their being divided into two fan-like organs in the Amphitrites, 
in which the digitations or tentacles proceed from a common 
base, and which together form the coronet. In some the digi- 
tations, like the sticks of a fan, are connected by an intervening 
membrane, thus resembling two expanded fans;® in others, 
this pair of organs forms two bunches, set, as it were, with 
numerous spirally convoluted plumes;^ in a third each bunch 
of plumy tentacles is convoluted, but not spirally;*" but the 
most magnificent species of the genus, if indeed it belongs to 
it, is that figured in the fifth volume of the Transactions of the 
Linnean Society,^^ under the name of Tubularia magnijica. I 



1 


Carus. Comp. Mat. i. 47. 


2 


Eudora. Lam. 


3 


Equorca. Lam 


4 


Cassiopca. Lam. 


5 


Aurdia. T(am. 


6 


Plate m. Fig. 9-11 


7 


Lamarck, Anim. sans Vertebr. v. 355. 






8 


Amphitritc Infundihulum. Linn. Trans. 


ix.t. 


viii. 


9 


A. volutacornis. Ibid. vii. t. v'n.f. 10. 






10 


A. vesiculosa. Ibid. xi. t. v./. 1. 


11 


Jbid.t.ix.f.^—r^ 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 245 

say, if indeed it belongs to it, because, if the figure quoted is cor- 
rect, which I am not aware there is any reason to doubt, the 
gills or tentacles, call them which we will, are not, as in the 
other species, divided into two fascicuh or bundles, the rays of 
which sit upon a common base ; but form one glorious and 
radiant coronet,^whose rays are beautifully annulated with red 
and white ; there appears indeed to be a double circle or series 
of these rays, the interior ones shorter than the exterior ; but 
there is not the least appearance of their division into two 
bunches, each forming a semicircle. The rays differ little from 
those of many of the polypes, except in being more numerous 
and longer, for the diameter of the circle, when the rays are 
all expanded, is nearly six inches, and it is not stated that the 
figure is magnified. 

Whenever the animal is alarmed it withdraws this gorgeous 
apparatus of respirato-prehensory organs within its tube, and 
the tube itself into its burrow in the living rock, as a safe refuge 
from its enemies. Whoever compares the above figure of this 
expanded animal-blossom with the nectaries of some species of 
passion-flower, will be struck by the resemblance they exhibit 
to each other,^ and by the analogy that evidently exists between 
them. As prehensory organs, the principal object of their 
unusual length and numbers may probably be their capturing, 
as in a net, a quantity of rock anim.als, or animalcules, suffi- 
cient for their support, and perhaps their very beauty may be a 
means of attraction and bring them within their vortex. 

With these splendid animals we bid farewell to those whose 
oral organs seem analogous to the blossoms of vegetables, and 
also to those in whom the organs of prehension and respiration 
are united ; or in which the same organs collect food and also 
act the part of gills. 

Though tentacles are not henceforth employed in respiration, 
yet they still exist in several other classes of animals as explo- 
ratory, prehensory, and locomotive organs. But in none are 
they more remarkable, both for their structure and uses, than 
in the Cephalopods or cuttle-fish. In these animals they are 
used, as we have seen, as arms for prehension, as legs for loco- 
motion, as sails for skimming the surface of the ocean, as oars 
for passing through its waves, as a rudder for steering, and as 
an anchor to fix themselves. 

These organs, like the tentacles of the* polypes, surround the 
mouth ; in some genera, as the poulpe,^ and sepiole,' besides 

1 See Linn. Trans, ii.f. iii./. a. b. 2 Octopus^, 

3 Sepiola. 



246 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

eight shorter arms,* there is a pair of very long one?!, which are 
usually denominated tentacles, byway of eminence, which the 
animal probably uses, and for which purpose a claw arms their 
extremity,^ to lay hold of prey at a distance. The means by 
which the tentacles perform the locomotions of these animals, 
and enable them to seize their prey, 1 shall advert to under 
another head. 

But though, in the great body of the Cephalopods, the ten- 
tacular organs do not exceed ten, we find, from Mr Owen's 
admirable memoir on the Pearly JVautilus,^ that, in that animal, 
they are extremely numerous, and strikingly different in their 
structure. Tlie mouth and its appendages are retractile within 
the head, which forms a sheath for them, the orifice of which 
is anterior. The proper tentacles are of two kinds : 1. Bra- 
chial ones, finely annulated, emerging from thirty-eight three- 
sided arms, disposed irregularly, nineteen on each side, all 
directed forwards, and converging towards the orifice of the 
oral 'sheath. 2. Labial ones, similar to the others in their 
structure, and emerging from four broad flattened processes, 
arising from the inner surface of the sheath, and more imme- 
diately embracing the mouth and lip : from each of these pro- 
cesses emerge twelve tentacles, rather smaller than the bra- 
chial ones. Besides these two descriptions of tentacles, there 
is a pair, one on each side, emerging from two orifices in the 
inner part of the hood or foot, arranging with the arms, and 
perhaps to be reckoned with the brachial tentacles, thus 
making up the whole number of tentacles of a similar structure 
eighty-eight. It is to be observed that neither the parts that 
sheath them, nor the tentacles themselves, are furnished with 
any acetabula or suckers.* 

Besides the tentacles, this animal has four analogous organs 
of a different structure, one before and one behind each eye, 
which Mr Owen likens to antennae, and wiiich are lamellated, 
or composed of a number of flattened circular disks, appended 
to a lateral stem ;* a circumstance indicating a variation in their 
functions. 

From their being retractile, it should seem that in this ani- 
mal the tentacles are not in constant use, as they are in the 
naked Cephalopods, and that they require protection ; fiom 
their finely annulated structure they appear to be flexible and 
easily applicable to any surface, but whether they are tentacu- 
lar or prehensory organs, or both, is unknown. In the account 

1 Plate VTl. Fkj. 3. ,/. 2 thid.h. :{ Kautilus PimpUius 

A Ownn'a JI^;moir, &C. 13. If. i. n. 5 Ibul. }4. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 247 

of the Loligopsis, a species of cuttle-fish, by the able pen of 
that eminent zoologist Dr Grant, the part apparently analogous 
to the labial tentaculiferous processes of the Nautilus, is called 
the outer-lip, and is stated to send out a muscular band to the 
base of each arm,'^ which seems to indicate that the arms of 
the naked Cephalopods are analogous to the labial tentacles of 
the animal we are considering. Tlie labial processes, with 
their tentacles, present some resemblance to a many-fingered 
hand,^ and from their situation immediately next the mouth 
may be conjectured to be most concerned either in the capture 
or transmission of its food : but whether either set of tentacles 
is used in its locomotions, as they are in the naked Cephalo- 
pods and the Argonaut, seems very problematical. 

As far as its locomotion on a surface is concerned, in its 
hood, it appears to be furnished with an expansile foot, ap- 
proaching that of the Gastropods,^ so that its tentacles seem 
not necessary to transport it from place to place on the bed of 
the ocean ; by what means it elevates itself, as it is known to 
do, to the surface, and floats upon the waves, has not been as- 
certained. 

In comparing the organs that surround the mouth of the 
Nautilus with those of other Cephalopods, we see that a 
vast change has taken place. They are i]o longer the princi- 
pal organs of locomotion, that function being transferred to an 
expansile foot; their number is increased in nearly a tenfold 
ratio : being deprived of suckers, they seem destitute of any 
powerful means of prehension and retention, and so are scarce- 
ly able to overcome the resistance of the larger Crustaceans. 
As their principal organ of locomotion is one that seems to pre- 
clude all idea of rapid motion in pursuit of their pre}^, it is most 
probable, as their mandibles are fitted for crushing crust or 
shell, that certain MolUiscans, animals which must be equally 
slow in their motions, and can scarcely resist them, are their 
destined food. 

We may further observe, that, regaid being had to the organs 
which surround the mouth, a very wide interval separates the 
great body of the Cephalopods, known in a recent state, from 
the animal now before us ; even the Spirula, which Mr Owen 
conjectures may belong to the same Order, in this respect is 
formed upon a very different type, precisely that of those Ce- 
phalopods.'* 



1 Trans, of Zool. Soc I. i. 23. 2 Owen, uhisvpr. t. iv.f, i i, g g. 

3 Owen's Mevioir, &.c. 12, t. i. // 1 Plate IV. Fio. 2. 



248 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

This animal, in the above respect, being so completely insu- 
lated, it seems, as if in its means of entrapping its prey it was 
formed upon a plan not connected with that of any other Mol- 
luscan, but quite sui generis: probably, were we acquainted 
with the animals belonging to what are deemed fossil Cepha- 
lopods, we should find the hiatus vastly narrowed. 

In this instance we see clearly that adaptation of means to 
an end which distinguishes all the works of the Creator ; the 
striking variation which this creature exhibits from the oral 
apparatus of its Class, is evidently connected with the kind and 
circumstances of the animals which it is commissioned to keep 
within their proper limits ; its mandibles, or beak, indeed, re- 
semble those of the other Cephalopods, indicating that its prey 
are covered with solid integuments, requiring great force to 
crush them ; but the other oral organs, and its snail-like foot, 
as we see, indicate that they are not of a kind that can easily 
escape from their assailants. 

Two objects seem to have been principally in the mind of 
the Almighty planner of the universe of beings: one seems to 
have been the concatenation of all subsistences, seriatim and 
collaterally, into one great system ; and the other, so to order 
and vary the structure of each individual that it may be duly 
fitted to answer a certain end, and produce a certain effect upon 
such and such points of that system, and this in such a way 
that these effects, though diverse, might not be averse, but pro- 
ceed, if I may so speak, in the same direction. Thus, in the 
subject before us, the general commission given to the Cepha- 
lopods, is to assist in reducing the armed population of the ocean 
within certain limits, and to all are given instruments and 
organs, varying indeed in their structure, but proper to enable 
them to effect this purpose ; all, however, concurring to bring 
about a common and connected object, and one taking one de- 
partment and another another. 

The tentacles of the Univalve Molluscans, for the headless 
animal of the Bivalves has no such organ, are neither used for 
locomotion nor prehension, and therefore seem to have no claim 
to a place in the present chapter. But as they are clearly the 
analogues of the tentacles of the animals we have been consid- 
ering, arid though not prehensory, are certainly exploring and 
sensiferouy organs, which are probably connected wilh prehen- 
sion, I shall make a few observations upon them. They vary 
in their number, some having none,^ others only two ;^ others 



1 Chiton. 2 Cijprica. I'oluta. J'i.\rE V'l. Fit.. I 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 249 

again four ;* and lastly, others six.^ They are without articu- 
lations, though they sometimes exhibit an annulated appear- 
ance :^ they are also often retractile, and in the snail and slug 
they form a hollow tube, which can be inverted like the finger 
of a glove ; in others they appear to be composed of longitudi- 
nal fibres, intersected by annular ones, which render them ca- 
pable of great extension. In form they are either filiform, seta- 
ceous, or conical; but in the remarkable genus Laplysia, or 
the Sea-hare, the upper pair are shaped like the ears of the 
animal from which they take their name. Their sense of touch 
is much more delicate than that of the rest of the body. They 
are intimately connected with what are usually deemed the 
organs of sight of the Univalve Moliuscans, which in some 
genera they seem to inclose. Some of these eyes are placed, 
in the form of a black pupil, at the summit of the tentacle, 
which surrounds them as the iris does the pupil of the perfect 
eye ; in others they are imbedded in the middle of that organ, 
and in othe.rs at its base; in some, as in the Sea-ear,^ they are 
seated in a separate footstalk. In many of the carnivorous 
species the pupil is surrounded by an iris,^ which seems to indi- 
cate that the tentacles perform, in some sort, the functions of 
that part of the eye. The upper pair of tentacles in the Mol- 
iuscans seem analogues of the antennce of Condylopes, and the 
lower pair of their feelers; and the functions for which the 
Creator has formed and fitted both are probably not very dis- 
similar. The extreme irritability of the tentacles of snails and 
slugs is evident to every one who observes their motion : at the 
approach of a finger they are immediately retracted ; they 
therefore give notice to the animal of the approach of danger, 
so as to provide against it, and when necessary to withdraw 
itself into its shell : the eyes, from their situation in many of 
them, supposing them to have a greater range and power of 
vision than they appear to have, cannot direct them in the 
choice of their food, in these their lower tentacles may have 
this oflftce. Snails and slugs, we also know, issue forth from 
their places of concealment when the earth is rendered moist 
enough, by showers, for them to travel easily over its surface; 
so that they must be endued with some degree of aeroscepsyy of 
which probably these delicate organs are the instruments. 

1 Helix. Limax. 

2 Clio. The tentacles in this genus are retractile, and when retracted 
form two tubercles, which make the head appear bilobed. 

3 Valuta JEthiopica, Plate VI. 4 Haliotis. 
5 Plate VI. Fig. 1, a. 

GG 



250 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

Whether the barbs appended to the months of many fishes, 
as the barbel, the Siluridans,^ and the Fishing-frog,^ may be 
regarded as a kind of tentacle cannot be certainly affirmed, 
but from their proximity to the mouth, it seems most probable 
that they exercise some function connected with the procuring 
of its food. Cuvier regards tiiem as a kind of tactors, and they 
also present some analogy to antennae and palpi. 

In many of the Anneiidans, tentacles of the present descrip- 
tion are found not only in the vicinity of the mouth, but also 
upon the pedigerous segments of the body, and appear to be 
equally used in exploring objecis.^ 

I shall next consider some tentacular organs, which differ 
from those we have been considering in being more or less 
jointed. These, on that account, have been considered as a 
different class of organs, and by many have been denominated 
cirri or tendrils, or more properly, by Savigny, tentacular cirri. 
I have before described organs of this kind in my account of 
the CirripedeSf^ by which it appears that they are employed 
for the same purposes as the tentacles of the ploypes. Under 
this head also the an (en nee of Crustaceans and insects may be 
noticed, which seem, as I have lately observed, analogous to 
the tentacles of the MoUuscans, and the barbs of fishes; in 
some instances, indeed, they are used instead of the fore legs.* 
The reason why their structure differs from the soft, inarticulate 
tentacles above described, at least in most cases, appears to be 
the different nature of the integuments of the animal, which 
being incased in a kind of coat of mail, it seems requisite that 
both its locomotive and oral organs should be similarly de- 
fended, and in this case, unless they had been jointed, they 
would have lost their flexibility, and so could not have exer- 
cised the functions assigned lo them by their Creator. It 
may, perhaps, be objected that the shell of the snail is nearly 
as hard as the crust of the lobster; but when we consider that 
the former, when moving, can thrust forth the greatest part of 
its soft body, as it were from a house, while the crust of the 
other is really its skin, this objection seems to vanish. 

Suckers. — The organs I am next to consider, acetahulay or 
suckers, are, in many cases, so intimately connected with ten- 
tacles, as to form the most essential feature of them, without 
which they can be of no use. In fact, in the Cephalopods, 

1 Plate XII. Fig. I 2 Lophius. Plate XIII. Fig. 2. 

3 Fn. Greenland, 294. 4 See above, p. 189. 

5 hUrod. to Ent. ii. 308 



PREHENSORY ORGANS, 



'251 



ttiey bear the same relation to the organ just named that the 
hand or foot do to the arm or leg, or the fingers and toes to 
the hand, in higher animals: they are the part by winch the 
animal takes hold of what it wants to seize; and by the alter- 
nate fixing and unfixing of which, upon a solid substance, it 
moves from place to place. A sucker* may be defined — ^An 
organ by which an animal is enabled to create a vacuum be- 
tween it, (the organ,) and any surface on which it rests, so as 
to produce a pressure of the atmosphere upon its upper part, 
and thus causing it to adhere firmly. 

Cuvier, speaking of the suckers of the Cephalopods, thus 
describes their action. When the animal approaches one or 
more of its suckers to a surface,. in order to apply it more in- 
timately, it presents it flattened ; when it is fixed to it by the 
perfect union of the surfaces, it contracts its sphincter, which 
produces a cavity, in the centre of which a vacuum is formed. 
By this mechanism, the sucker attaches itself to the surface 
with a force proportioned to its diameter, and to the weight of 
the column of water or of air of which it is the base. This 
force, multiplied by the number of suckers, gives that with 
which the whole or part of the legs attaches itself to the body, 
so that it is more easy to tear the legs, than to separate them 
from the object which the animal wishes to retain.^ 

In some cases, the action of the suckers, as suckers, seems 
not sufiicient for the animal's purposes, and claws are super- 
added. This structure is to be found in the suckers of the 
animal that fixes itself to the gills of the bream, the Diplozoon, 
before described,^ and to those of some Cephalopods a stout 
claw is added. 

When we consider the nature and predatory habits of those 
Cephalopods whose tentacles are furnished with suckers, often 
pedunculated, on that side which is prone when the animal 
moves, we shall at once see the reason that this change from 
the more comiAon Molluscan structure of an expansile foot, 
took place, for had their principal locomotive and prehensory 
organ been of this description, or different from what it is, their 
motions must necessarily have been so slow, and their powers 
of prehension so weak, that they could never have overtaken 
and captured, and maintained their hold of the well defended 
and formidably armed Crustaceans, which are their destined 
prey. Uncouth, therefore, and misshapen, and monstrous, as 

1 Suckers are denominated scientifically Mcetabula, and Cotyla, or Coty- 
loid processes. 

2 Anat. Comp. i. 410. Roget, B. T. i. 260. 3 See Appendix. 



252 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

these animals, at the first glance, appear, we see that in these 
organs, and doubtless in all others, they are exactly fitted to 
answer the end, and fulfil the purposes of Divine Providence in 
their creation. 

The suckers of the Diplozoon exhibit a complex structure in 
aid of its powers of suction, not easily developed and under- 
stood. Dr Nordmann supposes, that though the animal could 
attach itself strongly by these organs, additional means were 
necessary to render its attachment sufficiently firm ; and that, 
therefore, while it is fixing itself by the suckers, it requires the 
aid of the apparatus of hooks, or claws and arches, to keep 
itself from being misplaced.* 

The Class of Annelidans exhibits a great variety of locomo- 
tive organs, amongst the rest, in the last Order, we find suck- 
erSf these being the principal organs for motion of the Hiru- 
dineans or leeches, the animals of which Order, however, M. 
Savigny is disposed to think are essentially distinct from the 
rest of the AnneHdans, on account of their want of set or or la- 
teral bristles. The oral sucker of that division of the animals 
I am considering, to which the common leech^ belongs, is dis- 
guished from the anal one by being formed of many segments, 
whereas the latter consists of only one. Their motions, by 
means of these suckers, and the annular structure of their bodies 
I have before sufficiently described.^ Their suckers also enable 
them to lay hold of any aquatic animals that come in their way, 
especially the oral one, which once fixed they soon make an 
entry and begin to imbibe its blood. 

We see, in this, the reason why their Maker, instead of 
bristles for locomotion, has given them organs by which they 
can not only move from one place to another, but also fix them- 
selves firmly to their prey. 

I shall next advert to a kind of sucker which really becomes 
both the hand and foot of the animals that bear them. I al- 
lude to those of the Echinoderms^ described on%. former occa- 
sion,* in which the ampuUaceous part within the shell presents 
the first outline of a shoulder or thigh, the exerted extensile 
part that of an arm or leg, and the dilated part with which 
the animal seizes its prey or walks, the hand or foot; the two 
first constituting the tentacle, and the last the sucker. 

I have, on a former occasion, given some account, under 

1 See JVordmann, i. 61. «. v./. 3, 4,5. 

2 Sanguisvga medicinalis. Sav. 3 See above, p. 181. 
4 See above, pp. 108, 111. Plate III. Fig. 5. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 253 

the name of the Perch-pest,^ of a singular animal, belonging to 
the Lerneans, whose history has been given by Dr Nordmann, 
and which is distinguished by a sucker common to two legs. 
Several other Lerneans have similar suckers.^ 

Amongst insects are a variety of animals which are known to 
walk against gravity, we see the common flies, and other two- 
winged and four-winged insects, walk with ease upon the glass 
of our windows, and course each other over the ceilings of our 
apartments, without, in either case, falling from their lubricous, 
or seemingly perilous station. Writers on the subject are not 
agreed as to the means by which this is effected, some sup- 
posing that it is by atmospheric pressure, produced by suckers;' 
while others maintain that it is by a thick-set brush, composed 
of short bristles, on the underside of the foot, or b}^ certain 
appendages at the apex of the claw joint of that organ.* Pro- 
bably both these causes are in action, for though the pulvilli or 
foot-cushions of flies may adhere by mechanical means, those 
of some Hymenoptera and Orthoptera seem evidently furnished 
with suckers.^ In both cases the design of an Intelligent 
Cause is apparent; His wisdom, w^hich, under different cir- 
cumstances, contrives different means to attain the same end; 
His power, which gives effect to that purpose and contrivance; 
and His goodness, which causes every varied mean to subserve 
to the more convenience and comfort of the animals in which 
each obtains. Could we trace exactly the history and habits 
of every group of animals, nay, of each individual species, we 
should discover that the slightest variation was to answer a 
particular end ; and that even its very hairs and pores were all 
numbered with reference to special uses, foreseen by Divine 
Wisdom. 

Amongst other purposes for which suckers were given to the 
Class of Insects, one bears relation to the intercourse of the 
sexes. This is particularly observable in the males of the 
predaceous beetles,? especially the aquatic ones. In the ter- 
restrial ones'' indeed something of the kind takes place, for the 
males may be known by having the three or four first joints 
sometimes only of the anterior tarsi, and sometimes of the in- 
termediate, more or less dilated and furnished underneath with 
short bristles, intermixed, it should seem, with very minute 

1 See above, pp. 200, 205. 2 See Nordmann, t. vii. viii, 

3 Philos. Trans. 181G. 322. t. xviii. Introd. to Ent. ii. 322. White's 
Selborne, ii. 274. Ed. Markw. 

4 Blackwall in Linn. Trans, xvi. 487. 

5 Philos. Trans, ubi sup. t. xix. xxi. 

G Carnivora. Lat. 7 Cicindelidce, HarpalidcB, Cardbidm, «fec. 



254 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

suckers, and in some with transverse ones.* But these organs 
are most conspicuous in the male of our most common water- 
beetles,^ in which the three first joints of the anterior tarsus 
form a dilated orbicular shield, covered with minute suckers, 
sitting on a tubular foot-stalk, with two exceeding the rest 
greatly in size. The intermediate legs also have the three first 
joints thickly set with minute suckers. 

Leaving the invertebrated animals the occurrence of suckers 
becomes very rare; very few instances are upon record, in the 
whole Sub-kingdom of vertebrated animals, of this kind of for- 
mation, two in the Class of fishes and the other in that of 
reptiles, namely the lump-fishes,^ the sucking-fishes,"* and the 
Geckolizards.^ Under the name of lump -fishes I include all those 
whose ventral fins unite to form a disk or sucker by which they 
are enabled to adhere to the rocks, constituting Cuvier's family 
of Discoboles. But the most celebrated of this tribe, in ancient 
as well as modern times, are the sucking-fishes or Echeneis 
which Pliny says were so called from their impeding the course 
of the vessels to which they adhered. On the back of their 
head they have an oval cotyloid disk fitted with numerous 
transverse laminae denticulated at their posterior edge, forming 
a double series; by the aid of this apparatus, which appears to 
adhere by means of the teeth of its laminae as well as by suc- 
tion, this animal attaches itself to the whale, the dolphin, the 
shark, the turtle, and other inhabitants of the waters, and 
even to vessels that are sailing, and thus organs, which at first 
sight appear to stop all locomotion in the animal, are the means 
which enable it, like certain barnacles," to traverse half the 
globe. The fins of this animal do not permit it to swim 
with ease and velocity; and therefore this must be regarded as 
a compensating contrivance, by which it can the more readily 
fulfil its functions and instincts. Though they are disengaged 
with difficulty by human force from the vessel to which they 
are fixed, they very easily detach themselves, and swimming 
on their back, pursue any object that attracts their attention or 
excites their cupidity. 

It is singular to remark that in the case ofrtwo such animals, 
as the barnacle amongst the Cirripedes, which has naturally 
no locomotive powers and organs; and the Echeneis amongst 
the fishes, in which they are insufldcient to transport it far from 

1 E. G. Harpalus caliginosus. F. 

2 Dyticus manrhiaUs, *fcc. Pliilos. Trans, ubi supr. ^ xx. 

3 Cycloptcrus Lumpva, &c, 4 Echeneis. 

5 Gecito. Daud. HtcJlw. '^v.hn. Ascalabotes. iJwv. 6 See above, p. 191. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 255 

its native rocks and haunts, such means should be afforded by 
a kind Providence of visiting in safety the most distant oceans. 
These animals, though they may be called parasitic, from their 
adhering to other animals, yet, as they do not appear to imbibe 
any nutriment from them, the design of this singular instinct 
seems to be ir;erely their transport, for purposes not yet fully 
ascertained. 

But there are other fishes whose mouth is a suctorious organ, 
analogous lo that of the leech, by which they suck the blood 
of the aquatic animals they adhere to; of this description are 
the Lamprey^ and the Hag,^ but upon these I shall not further 
enlarge. 

The other sucker-bearing vertebrated animals, which I men- 
tioned, were those Saurians which form the genus Gecko, and 
the object of this structure, in them, is to enable them to walk 
against gravity, that thus they may be empowered to pursue the 
insects, possessing the same faculty, up perpendicular or along 
prone surfaces. These suckers,^ consisting of transverse laminss, 
occupy the terminal part of the underside of the toes. By aid 
of these organs they can mount the smooth chunam walls of 
houses in India. Another Saurian genus,* the Gecko, of the 
West Indies, has a similar organ, by means of which it climbs 
up trees, as well as the walls of houses, in the pursuit of insects. 

The adhesion of suckers and their relaxation, especially in 
locomotion, in order to answer the end for which they were 
given, must be as perfectly dependent upon the will of the ani- 
mal, as our steps on the plane we are moving on are upon 
ours; and yet in some instances, as in the perch-pest,^ the ani- 
mal, when once fixed, can scarcely disengage itself; but in 
this case, having attained its ultimate station, this is of no 
importance. 

If we study the individual cases of all the sucker-bearing 
animals, we shall find that this kind of organ was necessary, 
and all its modifications, to enable them to fulfil eflfectually their 
several instincts, and to do the work appointed them by their 
allwise Creator. For instance, in vain would the Cephalopods 
pursue and endeavour to seize and devour the crab or the lob- 
ster, if, instead of tentacles set wnth numerous suckers, they 
had the paws and retractile claws of the Fehne race: or how 
would the Gecko be enabled to overtake its insect provender, 
if its feet were like those of the rest of its class? 



1 Petromyzon. 2 Myxine. 

3 Philos. Trans. 1816. t. xvVi.f. 2. 4 dnolius. 

5 Jchtheres Percarum. See above, p. 252. 



256 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

As supplementary to this account of suckers, I may mention 
a locomotive organ, given to a very numerous tribe of inverte- 
brated animals, which, as I observed on a former occasion, ap- 
pears in some degree to partake of the nature of a sucker, and 
which is eminently adapted to the structure, circumstances, 
and wants of the animals that are provided with it. I mean 
the expansile foot of the great majority of Molluscans: these 
animals are the only instance of a unipede structure \n creation, 
but this one foot answers every purpose of a hand or leg; it 
spins for the bivalves their byssus,^ is used by otliers as an 
auger,^ by others as a trowel,^ and by others for other mani- 
pulations, and is generally their sole organ of locomotion : from 
its soft and flexible substance it can adapt itself to the surfaces 
upon which it moves, and by the slime that it copiousl}'^ secretes 
lubricates them to facihtate its progress. In very dry weather, 
however, it cannot move with ease over the arid soil, but when 
humid from rain, the whole terrestrial Molluscan army issues 
forth, naked, or in various panoply, each according to its kind, 
covering the face of the earth, so that it is not easy to avoid 
crushing them. 

The most careless observer of God's creatures must be struck 
by the correspondence between this foot, and the animal to 
which it is given ; had its locomotions been by means of an 
organ of a solid substance, or by means of several such organs, 
the harmony of structure which now strikes us, and relation- 
ship between its different parts would be done away, and we 
should think we beheld a mongrel monster engendered by 
strange mixtures of animals, rather than a creature harmoni- 
ously moulded by the hands of an allwise Creator. 

I may also mention here a few other organs which seem to 
present some analogy to suckers, and which, though aiding in 
locomotion, are not, strictly speaking, locomotive organs, or 
those by which locomotion is effected. I allude to the spuri- 
ous legs, or prolegs of the larves of insects. These are usu- 
ally retractile fleshy organs, analogous to the bristle-armed 
protuberances of the Annelidans, rendered necessary by the 
length of these animals, and supporting them as props, and 
which usually, by means of a coronet or semicoronet of hooked 
spines or claws, and by applying their prone surface to I he 
plane of position, take strong hold of it : these legs do not step ; 
the six anterior jointed legs, where they exist, are the walking 
legs ; but these organs having been fully described in another 

1 See above, p. 135. 2 Ibid. p. 133. 3 Ibid. p. 156. 



PREHENf^ORY ORGANS. ~ 257 

joint work of Mr Spence and myself I must therefore refer 
the reader for further information on the subject to that work. 

What are called the pectines or coinb-like organs of scorpions, 
and those pedunculated ones which are attached to the hind 
legs of the Solpuga or Galeodes, are conjectured by M. La- 
treille to be connected with the respiration of these animals. 
Amouroux seems to regard the former as a kind of sucker, 
but no actual observations have as yet ascertained their real 
nature, except that the author last named, states that he has 
seen the animals use them as feet. 

SetcB or Bristles. Having fully considered suckers and their 
analogues, I shall next advert to a species of locomotive organ, 
principally confined to the Annelidans, animals whose locomo- 
tions are chiefly produced by the contraction and expansion of 
the rings of which their body is composed, but which are also 
furnished with lateral setiform organs, which assist them in 
their motion, by pushing against the plane of position. 

The majority of these animals are aquatic, and some of them 
^row to a great size ; I have a specimen, which I purchased 
from the collection of the late lamented Mr Guilding, which is 
more than a foot long, and as thick as the little finger : it has 
a double series of what may be denominated its legs, each fur- 
nished at its extremity with a bunch of very fine retractile 
bristles, and those of the dorsal series having besides a bran- 
chial organ or gill on each side, consisting of numerous threads. 
This remarkable animal appears to belong to Savigny's genus 
Plelone, and is probably his P. Pedunculata, and the J^erHs 
gigantea of Linne. The bristles on these legs seem not calcu- 
lated for pushing on a solid surface, but are rather ogans of 
natation, analogous, in some degree, to the branching legs of 
the Branchiopod Entomostracans. In the earth-worms'' the 
lateral bristles are simple, and used to assist their motions, 
either on the surface, or when they emerge from the earth, or 
make their way into it. 

At first sight, one would not suppose the bristles of the Anne- 
lidans to be analogues of jointed legs, or preparatory to their 
appearance in the great plan of creation ; but when we reflect 
upon the approach which many of the Nereideans of Savigny 
make to the Myriapod CondylopeSy^ and that these bristle-bear- 
ing legs, in Mr Guilding's genus PeHpatus* begin to assume 
the appearance of articulations, and are armed at their apex 

1 Introd. to Ent. iii. 134. 2 Lumbricus. 

3 See above, p. 186. Plate VIII. Fig. 1, 4. 

4 Ibid. Fig. 1. 

HH 



258 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

with claws ;* it seems clear that the bristles of the Annelidans, 
and the base within which they are retractile, are really legs, 
and lead the way to the jointed ones of the Condylopes. 

I have before noticed the conversion of legs into oral organs, 
or their use as auxiliaries to them in the case of the Myria- 
pods.^ Mr Savigny, in his description of an animal,^ which 
seems the analogue of the electric centipede,* observes that its 
four anterior legs are converted into tentacular cirri, affording 
an additional argument for the ancient opinion that the marine 
Myriapods, as they might be denominated, have some affinity 
with the terrestrial, since, at least in this instance, the same 
number of legs are used as auxiliaries to the mouth. 

The great majority of the Annelidans inhabit the water, 
and the tufts of bristles, sometimes forming fans, issuing in 
many cases from a dorsal and ventral conical protuberance, 
denominated by Savigny oars, and occasionally expanding so 
as somewhat to resemble them, seem in some degree analogous 
to the branching legs of the Branchiopod and Lernean Ento- 
mostracans,^ and are probably natatory as well as ambulatory 
organs, and means by which their Creator has fitted the loco- 
motive ones to make their way through the matted sea-weeds 
and the mud, when creeping after their prey, as well as to row- 
through the water like a stately bireme. These oary feet, 
emulating in number those of the terrestrial Myriapods, and 
forming moreover, as was before stated, both a dorsal and ven- 
tral series, must enable them to move with considerable rapid- 
ity : those indeed that have observed their proceedings, describe 
them as both swimming and running with admirable ease and 
speed. ^ 

There is a Class of vertebrated animals, the Ophidians or 
serpents, which exhibit considerable analogy to many of the 
Annelidans, not only by their form and undulating movements, 
but also by the organs which effect their progressive motions, 
not indeed by means of bristles, but of parts that, pushing against 
the plane of position, propel the animal in any direction accord- 
ing to its will. 

But the way in which this is effected having been clearly 
and most ably explained by an eminent and learned physiolo- 
gist,^ I need not here enlarge upon it, but only observe that 



1 Ibid. Fig. 2. c. c. 2 See above, p. 224. 

3 Lycoris (cgy-ptia. Plate VIII. Fig. 4. 

4 Geophilus eleririats. 5 Flatx IX. Fig. W. 

6 See Otho Fabricius Faun. Gromlandy 289, 298, &c. 

7 I>r Roget. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 259 

the motion of one tribe of the Myriapods, thougli produced by 
legSf exactly imitates that of the Ophidians, though produced 
by ribs; and very amusing it is to see the propagation of it from 
one extremity lo the other in the MiUipedes, Hke wave suc- 
ceeding wave in the water: a still more striking analogy, as 
has been already remarked,^ is exhibited by the larger centi- 
pedes, which seem almost models of the skeleton of a serpent. 
Serpents thus can move not only horizontally, but also up 
the trunks of trees, probably in a spiral direction, and some are 
said to have the power of darting from one tree to another. 
As these animals are not annulated, like the Annelidans, and 
cannot originate and continue motion by the alternate contrac- 
tion and extension of the rings or segments of their body, which 
the nature of their integuments, their vertebral column, and 
muscular fibre probably preclude, the wisdom of their Creator 
has subjected their ribs to their will, so that they can use them 
as motive organs. 

J^atatory Organs. — The spurious bristle-armed legs of the 
Annehdans, especially those of Peripatus,^ have as it were led 
us to the mighty host of animals furnished with articulated 
locomotive or prehensory organs, or real legs and arms, vary- 
ing in number — but as these will best finish the subject, I shall 
first consider those external instruments of motion which are 
pecuHar to animals inhabiting the water, or moving through 
the air, beginning with the first, or those distinguished by nata- 
tory organs. I have already mentioned some of this description, 
as the oars of the paper nautilus^ and Annelidans,* and also 
the sails expanded by the former animal and several Mollus- 
cans.^ Before I consider the organs in question, where they 
are most conspicuous, in the fishes, I must give some account 
of those to be met with amongst the invertebrated animals, 
particularly the Condylopes. Several of the Cephalopods and. 
Pteropods, and other Molluscans, have natatory appendages ; 
in the former, as to many species, looking like little wings, often 
nearly round, attached to the lower part of the mantle that 
envelopes them f and in the latter assuming the shape and 
station of the dorsal and other fins of fishes,'' though totally 
different in their structure, not being divided into jointed rays 
as in the animals just named. 



1 See above, p. 225. 2 Plate VIIT. Fig. 1,2. 

3 See above, p. 167. 4 See above, p. 258. 

5 See above, p 142. 6 Plate VII. Fig. 1. 

7 Plate V. Fig. 6, 7, 8. 



260 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

Having mentioned these, I shall next advert more fully to 
the organs by which the great Sub-kingdom of animals with 
articulated legs move in the waters, whether they always in- 
habit them, or occasionally visit them. They may be divided 
into three distinct kinds. 1. Jointed legs dilated towards their 
extremities, as in the common whirl-wig,^ the little beetle that 
forms circles in the water, and in the tribe of crabs termed 
swimmers,^ these I would call Pediremes. 2. Jointed legs, 
that terminate in a fasciculus of setiform branches, and are also 
connected with the respiration of the animal, these might be 
denominated Branchiremes, and are found in the Branchiopod 
Entomostracans.^ 3. Those in which the inner side of the 
jointed leg has a dense fringe of hairs, called by Linne, by way 
of eminence, pedes natatorii, such as are found in many diving* 
and other aquatic beetles, these might be named Setiremes. 
As the spurious legs to which the eggs are attached, observable 
on the underside of the abdomen of the female lobster, cray- 
fish, and other long-tailed Crustaceans, are used also as nata- 
tory organs, they are ciliated for that purpose, and belong to 
this tribe. The same observation will also apply both to max- 
illary legs, and other legs of several animals of that Class. 
The velocity with which the diving-beetles move in the water 
by the action of these legs, and their suspension of themselves 
at the surface, by extending them so as to form a right angle 
with the body, when they come up for air, and the weather is 
fine and the water clear, affords a very interesting spectacle. 

Amongst natatory organs I must not overlook the tails of 
the long-tailed Decapod and several other Crustaceans, which 
terminate in a powerful natatory organ, consisting usually of 
five plates, densely ciliated at their apex, the intermediate one 
formed of the last segment of the abdomen, and the lateral 
ones articulating with a common footstalk giving them separate 
motion, the outer consisting sometimes of two articulations, 
as in the common lobster, and sometimes of only one, as in 
the thorny lobster; the intermediate plate, as in Galathea, 
sometimes consists of two lobes; these laminae when expanded 
form a most powerful natatory organ, which, if we consider 
the weight of their body, must be necessary to keep them from 
sinking, and by its vertical motion to enable them to rise or 
sink in the water. But natatory organs are not confined to 
those of the trunk and abdomen, even those of the head some- 
times assist in this kind of motion. Thus in Cypris, an Ento- 

1 Gyrinus. 2 Nageurs. Lam 

3 Platk IX. FiG.4. c 4 Dytictu 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 261 

mostracan genus, resembling a muscle, the mamdibles and 
first pair of maxillee have branchial appendages used also in 
swimming, and their antennae are likewise terminated by a 
fasciculus of threads, which, according to Jurine, the animal 
developes, more or less, as it wants to move ftister or slower/ 

But the most important natatory organs are those which 
enable the vertebrated inhabitants of the waters, from the giant 
whale to the pigmy minnow, to make their way through the 
waves; it will be interesting to trace the analogies of the fins 
of these animals to the locomotive organs, whether wings or 
legs of other animals, especially Mammalians. Some we shall 
find sui genenSf and calculated particularly for the circum- 
stances in which the Creator has placed the great Class o( fishes 
and the rest of the marine animals; and others, in the course 
of our analysis, we shall observe gradually assuming the cha- 
racter and uses of an arm or leg. 

Tlie fins of fishes are membranes, usually supported by os- 
seous or cartilaginous rays, which can open or shut, more or 
less, like a fan, but in some instances they consist of membrane 
without rays, and in others of rays without membrane. The 
rays are usually divided into two kinds ; those which consist of 
a single joint, usually less flexible and pointed, whence they 
are called spiny rays, and those which consist of numerous 
small articulations, generally branching at their extremity, 
which are called jointed rays, these jointed rays may be regard- 
ed as precursors of ihe phalanxes of fingers and toes in the 
hands and feet of the terrestrial vertebrated animals. The first 
pair of fins, which are seldom wanting, and answer to the fore- 
legs or arms of those animals, are called pectoral, and are usual- 
ly placed on the side behind the gill-covers. The second pair, 
supposed to be analogous to the hind-leg, are called ventral, and 
are placed under the abdomen. Besides these, there is often a 
fin along the back, sometimes subdivided, named the dorsal fin ; 
another under the tail, called the anal, and the tail itself ter- 
minates in a fin, one of the most powerful of all, which is 
named the caudal, and in some respects may also claim to be 
regarded as the analogue of the legs. 

The, so called, fins of Cetaceans, are not properly fins, but 
legs adapted to their element as marine animals, the anterior 
pair having all the bones proper to those of mammiferous ani- 
mals, covered with a thick skin, and wearing the appearance 
of a fin. In the sea-cow there are rudiments of nails in their 
pectoral fins, and they use them, both for crawling on shore, 

1 Latr. Cours D'Eni. i. 430. 



262 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

and for carrying their young, on which account they are called 
Manatins,^ of which Lamantins, their French name, is probably 
a corruption. The tail also of the Cetaceans, which is in the 
shape of the caudal fin of fishes, and somewhat forked, but 
placed horizontally, contains some bones, which appear like 
rudiments of those of legs, thus, for their better motion in an 
element they never leave, covered by their Creator with a ten- 
dinous skin, and enabling them by an up and down motion to 
sink to a prodigious depth, or to rise from the bottom to the 
surface of the ocean. 

If we go from the Cetaceans to the Amphibians, we see a fur- 
ther metamorphosis of the organs of motion. The pectoral 
fins of the former are now become arms, with phalanxes of 
fingers, claw-armed, but still connected by skin for natatory 
purposes, and their caudal fin is converted into rudimental legs, 
with a very short intervening tail, and these legs are still of 
most use in the water. These circumstances induce some 
suspicion, especially when we consider that the caudal fin of 
fishes is their most powerful locomotive organ, that it is the 
real analogue of the hind-legs of the terrestrial mammalians. 

The ventral fins sometimes seem to change place with the 
pectoral ones. This is the case with the fishing-frog tribe, in 
which the former are nearest to the head, and seem analogous 
to a pentadactyle hand, while the pectoral ones resemble a leg 
and foot, and the creature looks hke a four-footed reptile.^ The 
Rays,^ in a system, are placed at a wide distance from these, 
and yet they possess several characters in common, particu- 
larly in having the hinder part of the body attenuated into a 
tail more or less slender, and the enormous mouth and gullet 
of others* are armed, as in the sharks, with a tremendous appa- 
ratus of teeth. Cuvier observes of one of them,* tbat it can 
creep on the earth by means of its fins, like small quadrupeds, 
and that their pectorals discharge the function of hind-legs ;' 
so that there seems some ground for thinking that they are a 
branch diverging from the Selacians towards the Reptiles. 

Fins, and their analogues, were given to aquatic animals, it 
should seem, solely for locomotion ; and could we witness the 
motions of their different tribes, each in its place, and observe 
the play of these appendages, we should find them all so 
located in the body of the fish, and so nicely measured with 



1 Manatv^f ■Americaniut. 

2 See Platk XTII. Fi«. 1,3. Lophiadtr. Lophitis. L. 

:i Raiada. Ham. L. 4 Plate VIII. Fig. W. 

5 Chironectes. 6 liespic Anim. ii. 5251. Last Ed. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 263 

regard to volume and weight, as to suit exactly the wants of the 
animal in its station, and to act as a mutual counterpoise, so 
that it should not be overswayed by the preponderance of one 
organ over another ; every thing proving that the momentum 
and action of each, both independently, and in concert with the 
rest, had been nicely calculated before its creation, by one 
wiiose Wisdom knew no bounds, whose Will was the well 
being and well doing of his creatures, each in its place, and 
whose Power enabled him to give being to what his Wisdom 
planned, and his Will decreed. 

Nothing is more graceful and elegant than the motions of 
fishes in their own pure element. Not to mention the shifting 
radiance of their forms, as they glance in the sunbeam; their 
extreme flexibility, and the ease with which they glide through 
the waters, gives to their motions a character of facile progress 
which has no parallel, unless, perhaps, in the varied flight of 
the wing-swift swallow, amongst their analogues, the birds. 
How rapidly do they glide, and are lost to our sight by a mere 
stroke of their tail ! at another time, less alarmed, how quietly 
do they suspend themselves, and cease all progressive motion, 
so that we can discover them to be alive only by the fan-like 
movement of their pectoral fins, an action which seems, in some 
sort, connected with their respiration; for they move them, as 
I have observed, more rapidly, when, in sultry weather they 
seek the surface, and their muzzle emerges. These fins, the 
analogue, as has been before observed, of the hand or fore foot, 
except in a few instances, may be regarded as usually the first 
pair of oars that propel the vessel. Some fishes, in front of 
these, have another locomotive organ and weapon,^ not intend- 
ed, however, for motion so much in the water as on the earth ; 
this is a powerful, and, usually, serrated bone,^ articulating 
with the shoulder bones, and is to be found in the Siluridans, 
with the exception of the electric species, which its Creator has 
fitted with other arms. 

The second pair of fins, as they most commonly occur, are 
the ventral, but sometimes, where fishes have a large head, 
they are placed forwarder, and in general they are under the 
most bulky part of the body ; by this arrangement, we may- 
gather that they are intended to counteract the force of gravity, 
as well as to act as oars. These fins are wanting in all the 

1 Plate XII. Fig. 1. a. 2. 

2 N.B. The figure of the bone (2) in the Plate was taken from one dug 
up in this neighbourhood in forming a manure heap, which Mr Owen in- 
formed me belonged to a Silurus. 



264 /LOCOMOTIVE AND 

fishes called, on that account, apodes, or footless, to which the 
eels, and other serpentine fishes belong, some of which also 
have no pectorals. 

The caudal ov tail fin, which directs the locomotions of fishes 
as a rudder, and gives to them the chief part of their force and 
velocity, in the majority of real fishes is vertical, but in flat- 
fish, which have no natatory vesicle, it is horizontal, as it is 
likewise in the Cetaceans and Amphibians; in all these, its 
motion is vertical. 

The dorsal is also a powerful fin, consisting of spiny rays; in 
some tribes, as the perch, though wanting in others, it is some- 
times divided into two or three fins. By its various undulations, 
and by the differently inclined planes which it presents to the 
water, this fin augments the means of fishes to move in any 
direction, and adds much to the speed with which those last 
named pursue their prey: it counterbalances the effect of the 
caudal fin in cross-currents; but, if the animals could not de- 
press it, it might occasionally destroy the equilibrium, and 
overset them. 

The anal fin seems, in many fishes, intended as an antago- 
nist to the dorsal, to prevent the above effect and maintain the 
fish in its due position. 

But fins were given to fishes not only to be the instruments of 
motion in their own element, but likewise in that of terrestrial 
animals; to some they were given to enable them, under par- 
ticular circumstances, to vie with the birds in their aerial 
flights; to others, that like quadrupeds, they may undertake 
excursions upon Terra Jirma; and to a third description, amongst 
other means, to assist them in climbing the trees in quest of 
their food. Every body knows that the pectoral fins of the 
different species of flying fishes are very long; that by them, 
when leaping out of the water to avoid the pursuit of their 
enemies, the bonito,^ and other rapacious fishes, they are sup- 
ported in the air for a short time ; but the action is really not 
flying, since they use these fins merely as an aeronaut, in de- 
scending, uses a parachute, for a support in the air; in fact, 
flying from aquatic enemies, they are soon attacked by aerial 
ones, and the frigate,^ and other marine birds, make them their 
prey — so that they take short flights, as well as short voyages — 
and though they swim rapidly, they are soon tired, which is the 
means of saving those that escape from their numerous ene- 
mies, and preventing the extinction of the race. Besides the 

1 Scomber Pelami. 2 Tachypetes J^quila. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 265 

common flying-fish/ the Pegasus,^ a small fish, inhabiting the 
Indian ocean, when puisued, leaps out of the water, and takes 
a short flight. 

I mentioned on a former occasion,^ the terrestrial excursions 
of the Hassar, and from the statement of Piso, in his Natural 
History of the Indies, published in 1658, and from that of 
Marcgrave, of Brazil, quoted by Linne in the Jlmxnitates Aca- 
demiccK^* it appears that the Callicthys^ migrates in the same 
way. Dr Hancock mentions a fish, perhaps a Loricaria^ which 
has a bony ray before the ventral as well as the pectoral fins, 
and which creeps on all fours upon the bed of the rivers, per- 
haps even when they are dry. These Httle quadruped fishes 
must cut a singular figure upon their four stilts. 

I have given a full account of a climbing fish amongst the 
migratory animals,^ and shall therefore now take my leave of 
the finny tribes. 

Perhaps the fins of the Cetaceans and Amphibians, above 
described, inasmuch as they are enveloped not in a membrane, 
like the fins of fishes, but are real feet adapted to their ele- 
ment, may be regarded as more analogous to what are called 
paddles, by which term the natatory apparatus of the Chelo- 
nian reptiles, and of the marine Saurians, hitherto found only 
in a fossil state, are distinguished. These in the former, the 
turtles, are formed by the legs and toes being covered by a 
common skin, so as to form a kind of fin, the two first toes of 
each leg being armed with a deciduous nail. The coriaceous 
turtle,'' the parent of the Grecian lyre, which presents no small 
analogy to the Amphibians, has no scales either upon its body 
or feet, but both are covered with a leathery skin, even its 
shell resembling leather, and therefore it connects the paddles 
of tfie Chelonians with those of the marine Mammahans. It 
may be defined as a natatory organ, formed of several jointed 
digitations, covered by a common leathery or scaly integument. 
In the fossil Saurians the paddle appears to be formed of nume- 
rous bones, arranged in more than five digitations, but it is 
shorter and smaller, and seems better calculated for still waters 
and a waveless sea than to contend with the tumultuous fluc- 
tuations of the open ocean.® 

Next to the paddles of the turtles, and fossil Saurians, come 

1 Exocatus exiliens in the Mediterranean, and E. volitans in the ocean, 
but doubts are said to rest upon this species. 

2 P. Draco, volans, &c. 3 See above, p. 64. 

4 I. 500. «. xi./. 1. 5 Plate XII. Fig. 1. 

6 See above, p. 65. 7 Sphargis coriacea. 

8 See Philos. Trans. 1816. t. xvi. and 1819. t. xv. 

n 



266 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

the palinated or web-foot of the aquatic tortoises, and of nurae- 
rous oceanic birds, in which the toes are united by a common 
skin. In the paddle the leg and toes together form the nata- 
tory organ ; in the palmated, or lobed foot, the toes. Thus 
from fins we seem to have arrived at digitated legs. 

Wings. — Turning from the denser medium of water, we 
must next inquire what organs have been given to animals by 
their Creator to enable them to traverse the rarer medium of 
air, to have their hold upon what to the sight appears a non- 
entity, and to withstand the fluctuating waves of the atmos- 
pheric sea, and the rush of the fierce winds which occasionally 
sweep through space over the earth. The name of wings has 
by general consent been given, not only to the feathered arm 
of the bird, but also to those filmy organs extended, and often 
reticulated, by bony vessels — the longitudinal ones in some 
degree analogous to the rays of the fins of the fishes, especi- 
ally of the flying fishes — which so beautifully distinguish the 
insect races ; as well as to the rib-supported membrane forming 
the flying organs of the dragon ; and those hand-wings by 
which the hats with so much tact and such nice perception 
steer without the aid of their eyes through the shrubs, and 
between the branches of trees ; those also of other mammife- 
rous animals, such as the flying squirrel and flying opossum use 
in their leaps from tree to tree. 

Savigny is of opinion that certain dorsal scales, in pairs, ob- 
servable in two of the genera^ of his first family of Nereideans," 
are analogous to the elytra and wings of insects : this he infers 
from characters connected with their insertion, dorsal position, 
substance and structure, but not with their uses and functions ; 
for, as he also states, they are evidently a species of vesicle, 
communicating by a pedicle with the interior of the body, 
which, in the laying season, is filled with eggs,^ a circum- 
stance in which they agree with the egg-pouches of the Ento- 
mostracans ; and therefore Baron Cuvier's opinion, that there 
is little foundation for the application of this term to these or- 
gans* seems to me correct. 

Wings may be divided into organs of flight and organs of 
suspension. The first are found in insects, in which they are 
disfctnct from the legs; in iirrf^, in which the anterior leg of 

1 Halithca a.nd Pohj7wc. Sec Jiphrodita Clara. MonUignc in Liun. Trajn:. 
ix. 108, f. vii./. 3. 

2 Jlphrodito'. 3 Syst. dcs AnncL 127. 
4 Regn. Jlnim. in. J20(). 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. Zbl 

quadrupeds becomes a wing ; and in bats and vampyres, in 
which both the anterior and posterior legs support the wing. 

The second kind of wings is found in the flying cat, the flying 
squirrel, and the flying opossum; and, under a different form, in 
the flying dragon of modern zoologists. 

The wings of insects differ materially from those of birds, and 
of certain Mammalians : for instance, the bats and vampyres, 
since in them they are not formed by skin or membrane, at- 
taclied to the fore-leg, or both legs, but are distinct organs 
implanted in the trunk, usually leaving the animal its classi- 
cal number of legs, for its locomotions on terra firma. These 
organs are composed of two "membranes, closely applied to 
each other, and attached to elastic nervures issuing from the 
trunk, and accompanied by a spiral trachea or air-vessel. 
These nervures vary in their number and distribution : in some 
insects the wing has none except that which forms its anterior 
margin,^ and in others the whole wing is reticulated by them;^ 
the longitudinal ones often give an inequality to the surface, 
and form it into folds, which probably, in flight, it can relax or 
contract according to circumstances. In some genera^ the 
wing is folded longitudinally in repose, and in others also trans- 
versely.* In the higher animals the wings never exceed a 
single pair ; but in insects the typical number is four ; and 
though some are called Dipterous, or two- winged, yet even a 
large proportion of these have, in the winglets,^ the rudiment 
of another pair. The anterior pair, called elytra, &c. in the 
beetles, and some others, are principally useful to cover and 
protect the wings when unemployed, still they produce some 
effect in flight, and they partake in a reduced degree of the 
motion of the wings, those of the cock-chaffer^ describing an 
arc equal to only a fourth part of that of the latter organs. 

M. Jurine, in which he is followed by M. Chabrier, has 
regarded the primary wing of insects as analogous to the wing 
of birds ; but though this may hold good in some respects, it 
does not in its main feature. If we consider that the wing of 
birds is really the analogue of the fore-leg of quadrupeds, and 
replaces it ; and also that insects have a representative of that 
leg fixed to the anterior segment of the trunk, thence called 
the Manitrunk, in contradistinction to the Alitrunk, which 
bears the wings ; it seems not probable that the anterior leg, and 
the anterior wing which belong to different segments, should 

1 PsUiis, &c. See Jurine Hymenopt. t. v. and xiii. G. 48. 

2 Libellulino' 3 Vespidce. 4 Coleoptera. 
5 MvlcE,. 6 Melolontha vulgaris. 



268 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

be analogues of the same organ. The first pair of wings, or 
their representatives, the elytra, are connected with the hip- 
joint,^ by an intermediate piece called the scapular ;'* and the 
posterior wings are connected with the same joint of the pos- 
terior legs by the parapleura,^ so that, in some sort, the wings 
of insects may be regarded as appendages, — not of ihe fore-legs y 
or arms, which are the real analogues of the fore-leg of quad- 
rupeds, and wing of birds, — but the first pair of the mid-legs, 
and the second of the hind-legs. 

Some winged insects, especially the dragon-flies, like the 
crabs and spiders, can retrograde in their flight, and also move 
laterally, without turning ; thus they can more readily pur- 
sue their prey, or escape from their enemies. The situation of 
their wings is usually so regulated in the majority with respect 
to their centre of gravity, as to enable them to maintain nearly 
a horizontal position in flight ; but in some, as the stag-bee- 
tles,* the elytra and wings have their attachment in advance 
of that point, so that the head, prothorax, and mandibles do 
not fully counterpoise the weight of the posterior part of their 
body, occasioning this animal to assume a nearly vertical posi- 
tion when on the wing. 

The apparatus and conditions of flight in birds and insects 
are very different, varying according to the functions and struc- 
ture of the animal. In birds a longer and more acute anterior 
extremity distinguishes the wing, by which their Creator ena- 
bles them to pass with more ease through the air ; but in in- 
sects that extremity is not a trenchant point that can win its 
own way, but usually is very blunt, opposing either the por- 
tion of a circle, or a very obtuse angle to it ; hence perhaps it 
is that the common dung-beetle,^ which is a short obtuse ani- 
mal, " wheels its droning flight" in a zig-zag line, like a ves- 
sel steering against the wind, and thus it flies, as every one 
knows, with great velocity as well as noise. This also may 
be one reason why insects have usually a greater volume of 
wing than birds, and that a very large number are fitted and 
adorned with four of these organs, which can sometimes hook 
to each other, by a beautiful contrivance,^ and so form a single 
ample van to sail on the aerial waves, and bear forward the 
bluff-headed vessel. The motions, in the air, of numerous in- 
sects are an alternate rising and falling, or a zig-zag onward 
flight, in a direction up and down, as all know who have ob- 

1 Coxa. Sco Fntrod. to Ent. iii. 661. 2 Scapiilnrc. Ibid. rm. 

3 /feu/. 575. 4 Lucanus. 

5 Geotrupes stcrcoraruis, &c. 6 Mon. Ap. ^/ingl. i. 108. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 269 

served the flight of a butterfly, or a kind of hovering in the 
air, or a progress from flower to flower, or backwards and for- 
wards and every way in pursuit of prey, — how admirably has 
their Creator furnished them to accomplish all these motions 
with the greatest facihty and grace. And though their wings 
are usually naked, without any representative of those plumes 
which so ornament the wings of birds, and give them as it 
were more prise upon the air, yet in one numerous tribe,^ the 
moths and butterflies, they rival the birds, and even exceed 
them, both in the brilliancy of the little plumes, or rather scales, 
which clothe the wings, and the variety of the pattern figured 
upon them, and likewise of their forms and arrangement. So 
that every one, who minutely examines them in this respect 
with an unbiassed mind, can hardly help exclaiming, — I trace 
the hand and pencil of an Almighty Artist, and of one whose 
understanding is infinite, and who is in himself the architype of 
all symmetry, beauty, and grace ! 

The wings of a variety of insects, though few, save the Le- 
pidoptera, are ornamented with scales, are planted with little 
bristles, more or less numerous or dispersed ; these Chabrier 
thinks, as well as the scales now alluded to, amongst other 
uses, are means of fixing the air in flight, as well as augment- 
ing the surfaces, and points of arrest, in each wing.^ They 
also strengthen the wing and add to its weight, and doubtless 
have other uses not so easily ascertained. Hair, in scripture, 
is denominated power, and probably those fluids, which we can 
neither weigh nor coerce, find their passage into the body of 
the animal, or out of it, by these little conductors ; and thus 
the various piligerous, plumigerous, pennigerous, and squami- 
gerous animals, may offer points and paths not only to the air, 
but to more subtile fluids, either going or coming, whose in- 
fluences introduced into the system, may add a momentum to 
all the animal forces, or, which having executed their commis- 
sion and become neutralized, may thus pass off into the atmos- 
phere. 

But of all the winged animals which God has created and 
given it in charge to traverse the atmosphere, there is none 
comparable to the great and interesting Class of birds, which 
emulating the insects on one side by their diminutive size and 
dazzling splendours, on the other vie with some of the Mam- 
malians in magnitude and other characters. Here we have 
the humming-birds of America, scarcely bigger than the hum- 
ble-bee ; and there the savage condor of the same country, 

1 Lepidoptera. 2 Sur le Vol des Ins. 24. 



270 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

whose outstretched wings would serve to measure the length 
of the giant elephant or rhinoceros. Though we cannot mount 
into the air ourselves, yet every one, from the peasant to the 
prince, that is able to follow the flight of the birds with his 
eyes, is delighted with the spectacle of life that they exhibit 
in the aerial regions, and we should scarcely miss the beasts 
of the earth and all the creatures that are moving in all direc- 
tions and paces over its surface, than we should the disappear- 
ance of the birds of every wing from the atmosphere. And 
therefore the prophet in his sublime description of the desola- 
tion of Judah, makes the disappearance of the birds of heaven 
the most striking feature of his picture. / beheld the earth, says 
he, and lo, it was without form and void : and the heavens, and they 
had no light; I beheld the mountains, and lo, they trembled, and ail 
the hills moved lightly. 1 beheld, and lo, there was no man, and 
all the birds of the heavens were fled^. 

The wing of these animals, in many cases, so powerful to 
bear them on through the thin air, and counteract the gravity 
of their bodies; to take strong hold of that element which man 
cannot subdue like water, to move through himself, and so to 
push themselves on, often with the swiftness of an arrow, 
through its rushing winds or almost motionless breath : the 
wing of birds is in fact the fore-leg or arm adapted and clothed 
by Supreme Intelligence, for the action it has to maintain, and 
for the medium in which that action is to take place, and con- 
sists of nearly the same parts as the fore-leg in Mammalians, 
for there is the shoulder,^ fore-arm,^ and the hand,* with the 
analogue of a thumb, called the winglet,^ and of a finger." 
The ten primary quill feathers are planted in the hand, and 
the secondaries, varying in number, on the fore-arm, these quill- 
feathers, being very principal instruments of the wing in flight, 
are also named the remiges or rowers of the vessel. The pri- 
mary feathers usually vary in length, the external ones being 
the longest, so as to cause the wing to terminate in a point; 
those that cover the shoulder are called scapulars; and those 
short ones that cover tlie base of the wings above and below 
are called coverts.'^ Wings usually curve somewhat inwards, 
are convex above and concave below, and are acted upon by 
very powerful muscles. Wonderful is the structure of the 
feathers that compose them, and each is a master-piece of the 
Divine Artificer. In general it is evident that each has been 

1 Jercm. iv. 2[\ — 25. 2 Hiimcrvs. 

3 Cubitus. 4 Oirjms and Mrtorarinis, 

5 MuJa. (» Di<ritus. 7 IWlricrs. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 271 

measured and weiglied with reference to its station and func- 
tion. Every separate feather resembles the bipinnate leaves of 
a plant; besides the obvious parts, the hollow quill, and sohd 
stem bearded obliquely on both sides with an infinity of little 
plumes ; each of these latter is also formed with a rachis or 
mid-rib set obliquely with plumelets, resembling hairs, and 
exactly incumbent on the preceding one, and adhering, by their 
means, closely to it, thus rendering the whole feather not only 
very light, but, as it were, air-tight. In the goose, the mid-rib 
of the plumelets of the primary feathers is dilated towards the 
base into a kind of keel, so that each plumelet at the summit 
looks like a feather, and at the base like a lamina or blade. 

By the use of very fine microscopes of garnet and sapphire 
Sir David Brewster succeeded in developing the structure of 
the plumelets; he discovered a singular spring consisting of a 
number of slender fibres laid together, which resisted the divi- 
sion or separation of the minute parts of the feather, and closed 
themselves together when their separation had been forcibly 
effected.^ 

If we examine the whole wing, and the disposition and 
connection of the feathers that compose it, we shall find that 
one great object of its structure is to render it impervious to the 
air, so that it may take most effectual hold of it, and by push- 
ing, as it were, against it, with the wing, when the wing-stroke 
is downwards, to force the body forwards. A person'expert in 
swimming or rowing, may easily get an idea how this is ef- 
fected, by observing how the pressure of his arms and legs, or 
of his oars, against the denser medium, though not in the same 
direction, carries him, or his boat, forwards. In the case of the 
bird, the motion is not backwards and forwards, but upwards 
and downwards, which difference, perhaps, is rendered neces- 
sary by the rarer medium in which the motion takes place. 

To facilitate the progress of the bird through the air, the 
head usually forms a trenchant point, that easily divides it and 
overcomes its resistance; and often to this is added a long neck, 
which, in the case of many sea-birds, as wild geese and ducks, 
is stretched to its full length in flight; while in others, where 
centre of gravity requires it, as in the heron,^ bittern,^ &c., it 
is bent back. 

The swiftness of the flight of some birds is wonderful, being 
four or five times greater than that of the swiftest quadruped. 
Directed by an astonishing acuteness of sight, the aquiline 

1 Lit. Gazette, Oct. 11, 1834, 690. 

2 Ardca cinerca. 3 ji. stellaris. 



272 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

tribes, when soaring in the air beyond human ken, can see a 
little bird or newt on the ground or on a rock, and dart upon it 
in an instant, like a flash of lightning, giving it no time for 
escape. But though some birds are of such pernicious wing, 
ihere are others of the most gigantic size, for instance the 
ostrichi^ emu,^ &c. that have only rudiments of wings, and 
which never fly, and for their locomotions depend chiefly upon 
their legs, to which the muscles of power are given, instead of 
to the wings. 

Amongst the terrestrial animals that give suck to their young, 
there is a single Family which the Creator has gifted with 
organs of excursive flight, and these afford the only example 
of the third kind of those organs mentioned above. These 
cannot, like insects and birds, traverse the earth upon legs, as 
well as flit through the air u^on wings; for the analogues of 
the legs of quadrupeds, not solely of the anterior pair, as in 
birds, but of both pairs, form the bony structure by which the 
wing is extended and moved, and to which it is ^attached. It 
will be immediately seen that I am speaking of the hats and 
vampyres. These animals, which form the first Family of 
Cuvier's Order of Carnivorous Mammahans,^ are denominated 
Cheiroptera, or hand-winged, because in them the four fingers 
of (he hand, the thumb being left free, are very much elongated 
so as to form the supports and extensors of the anterior portion 
of the membrane of which the wing is formed ; while the hind 
leg and the tail, in most, perform the same office for the pos- 
terior portion of the wing: so that two wings appear to be 
united to form one ample organ of flight. The membrane 
itself, which forms the wing, is only a continuation of the skin 
of the flanks : as in the wings of insects, it is double, very fine, 
and so thin as to be semi-transparent; it is traversed by some 
blood-vessels, and muscular fibres — doubtless accompanied by 
nerves — which when the wings are folded form little cavities 
placed in rows, resembling the meshes of a net. As bats are 
not provided with air-cells, or air in their bones, like birds, and 
their flight is unassisted by feathers, these wants are compen- 
sated to them by wings four or five times the length of their 
body. Their flight is of a different character from that of birds, 
resembling rather the flitting of a butterfly ; when we consider 
that the peculiar function of bats is to keep within due limits 
the numbers of crepuscular and nocturnal insects, especially 
moths, we see how necessary it was ihat they should be ena- 
bled (o traverse every spot frequented by the objects their 

1 iStruthio. 2 Casiiarius. 3 I.fn Caniassirrs 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 273 

instinct urges them to pursue and devour. For this purpose 
their wings are admirably adapted not only by their volume, 
but by their power of contracting ihem, and giving them vari- 
ous inflections in flight, so that their speed is regulated by the 
object they are pursuing. ^ 

When we farther reflect that their eyes are small and deep- 
seated, we may conjecture that it requires extraordinary tact 
and dehcacy of sensation in some other organs to supply this 
defect in its sight. Spallanzani found that blind bats fly as 
well as those that have eyes ; that they avoided most expertly 
threads of fine silk which he had so stretched as just to leave 
room for them to pass between them ; that they contracted, at 
will, their wings, if the threads were near, so as to avoid touch- 
ing them ; as well as when they passed between the branches 
of trees ; and also that they could suspend themselves in dark 
places, such as vaults, to the prominent angles. He deprived 
the same individuals of other organs of sensation, but they 
were equally adroit in their flight, so that he concluded they 
must have some sensiferous organs different from those of other 
animals to enable them to thread the labyrinths through which 
they ordinarily pass. 

Dr Grant observes on this subject — "Bats are nocturnal, 
but, contrary to what is generally the case with nocturnal ani- 
mals, their eyes are minute and feeble, and indeed, compara- 
tively speaking, of minor importance, for so exquisite is the 
sense of feeling diffused over the surface of their membranous 
wings, that they are able to feel any vibration of air however 
imperceptible by us; they can tell, by the slight rebound of 
the air, whether they are flying near any wall, or opposing 
body, or in free space though their eyes be sealed or removed."* 
A similar observation was long ago made by Mr Bingley.^ 

We see in the circumstances here detailed a remarkable in- 
stance of the Power, Wisdom, and Goodness of the Creator, in 
compensating for the absence or imperfection of one or more 
senses, by adding to the intensity of another, and in establish- 
ing its principal seat in organs so nicely adapted to derive most 
profit by the information communicated. 

An animal nearly related to the vampyres, the cat-ape,^ com- 
monly called the flying cat, and by some the flying dog, though 
nearly related to the bats, and included by Cuvier in the same 
Family, differs essentially from them, in being furnished with 
organs formed by the skin of the flanks connected with the 

1 Quoted in Lit. Gaz. Feb. 0, 1834. 2 Mem. of Brit. Quad. 34. 

3 Galeopithecus. 
KK 



274 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

legs of each extremity, which are calculated for suqoension 
rather than liight, being used, as Cuvier remarks, merely as a 
parachute, and thus belong to the second kind of wings, men- 
tioned above. This animal, which climbs like a cat, vaults 
from one tree to another, by the aid of the above skin, which 
supports it in the air. The petaurists,^ or flying squirrels, and 
the phalangists,^ or flying opossums are similarly equipped, 
and for a similar purpose. Tlie common squirrel,^ using its 
tail as a rudder, leaps with great agility from tree to tree, 
without the aid of this kind of parachute, the force of its spring 
being sufl[icient to counteract that of gravity. Providence has 
evidently added an organ of suspension, in the case of the three 
former animals, either because their vaults were necessarily 
longer, or because the greater weight of their bodies required it. 

The dreaded name of dragon, attached to the monsters of 
fable, has excited in our imagination ideas of beings clothed 
with unwonted terrors, from our earliest years, so that when 
we find the only animal that inherits their name is an insig- 
nificant lizard, not more than eight inches long, we are tempt- 
ed to exclaim, Parturiunt mantes. This little animal, under 
the name of wings, is furnished with two dorsal appendages 
independent of the legs, formed of the skin, and actually sup- 
ported by the six first short ribs, which, instead of taking their 
usual curvature, are extended in a right line. These organs 
are not used to fly with, but to support the animal in its leaps 
from branch to branch, and from tree to tree. 

We see in this instance, how exactly the means are adapted 
to the end proposed. This animal walks with difficulty, and 
consequently seldom descends from the trees. It is therefore 
enabled to move from one part of a tree to another, not by its 
legs, but by an organ formed out of its ynbs! How various and 
singular, in this instance, as well as in that of serpents, before 
alluded to,* are the means adopted by a Being, who is never 
at a loss to answer the foreseen call of circumstances by wise 
expedients. 

Steering Organs.^ — But wings are not the only organs of 
flight with which the Creator has fitted those animals, to which 
he has assigned the air as the theatre of their most striking and 
interesting locomotions. They would be like a ship at sea 
without a rudder, and be altfigctiier at the mercy of every wind 
of heaven, hiul they no means to enable them to steer ilioii 
vessel througli the fliictualion.sof the vicwk\-s element assigned 

1 Petauriis. .'i V/i(ihiiiois(<i. 3 Sciurujs riilgaria. 

4 See above, p. ii58. G Uubcnmculu. 



PRETIENSORY OROANS. 275 

to tliem. The eagle and (be vulture would be gifted in vain 
with the faculty of seeing objects at a great distance, had they 
no other organ than their sail-broad vans to direct them in 
their lligbt. The same remark will apply as well to the insect 
as to the bird, wbicb would in vain endeavour to discharge its 
functions, unless it could steer its course according to the direc- 
tion of its will and the information furnished by its senses. 
But, upon examination, we shall find that God hatb not left 
himself without witness in tliis department, but bath furnished 
every bird and insect witb such an organ of steerage as the 
case of each required ; nay, even amongst tbe beasts and the 
reptiles we may discover similar means of directing their 
motions, especially when they leap, whether from the ground, 
or from tree to tree. 

The caudal fin, or tail of fishes, may be regarded as belong- 
ing in some degree to this head ; but as this is also tlieir priii- 
cipal organ of locomotion, I thought it best to consider it with 
the other fins. 

The abdomen of mixny insects seems to serve tliem as a rudder, 
being composed of several inosculating rings formed each of a 
dorsal and ventral segment ; it is capable of considerable flexion 
in almost all directions ; it can be elevated or depressed, and 
turned to either side, so that it seems, in a great degree, calcu- 
lated to enable insects to change the course of their flight 
according to their will. But besides this important organ — 
which by the air it is constantly inspiring adds force also to the 
internal impulse, and to the air-vessels in the wings — insects 
have other auxiliaries to keep them in their right course. 
Whoever has seen any grasshopper take flight, or leap from the 
ground, will find that they stretch out their hind legs, and, 
like certain birds, use them as a rudder. The tails also of the 
day-flies^ seem to be used by them as a kind of balancer in 
their choral dances up and down in the sun's cjeclining beam. 

But the most interesting and beatiful organ for steering ani- 
mals in the air, is that formed by the tail feathers of birds, 
called by ornithologists, reclrices, ov governing feMhers, because 
they are used to direct their course ; these are feathers planted 
in the rump,^ usually twelve in number — ^Imt in some amount- 
ing to nearly tw^enty — constituting two sets of feathers of six 
each, and forming together a kind of fork like the caudal fin of 
some fishes ; the inside of each feather is set with much larger 
plumelets than the outside, so that there is a double series of 
corresponding feathers beginning one on (he right side, and (he 

1 Ephemera 2 UropT/^mm. 



276 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

Other on the left ; the middle feathers in each series differ 
sometimes fFom the five exterior ones, being more acute, and 
wearing a different aspect. In flight the tail-feathers appear 
to be expanded, and probably the bird, by giving an impulse to 
either series, can turn this way or that ; or by their depression 
or elevation, judging from their analogy with the caudal fin of 
fishes, rise or fall. The rudder-tail here described is that of 
the male bull-finch ;^ in many birds of the Gallinaceous Order, 
as the common cock and peacock, these feathers form a glori- 
ous ornament, but seem to lose their use as a steering appa- 
ratus. In the black game^ the two sets of feathers of the tail 
turn outwards, one on each side, and so form a fork ; and, in 
our domestic poultry, these sets of feathers, when not expanded, 
fold upon each other. Some of the waders,^ the tail-feathers 
of which are short, use their long legs, like the grasshoppers, 
as a rudder in flight, stretched out straight behind them. 

Many of the web-footed birds,* as the goose and duck tribes, 
also have these feathers very short, which seems a convenient 
provision for aquatic birds, but whether their legs assist in 
directing their course seems not to have been ascertained. 
Some of them, however, as the pin-tail duck^ have the middle 
feathers of the tail elongated, as they are in many other birds; 
in the swallow tribe,*^ and the sea-swallow,'' the external 
feathers of the tail are elongated, as these birds are frequently 
turning when in the air, and flying backwards and forwards ; 
their Creator has thus equipped them for their ever changing 
evolutions. Some birds, as the thrushes,^ magpies,^ and other 
crows, have all the tail feathers long, which gives great power 
to them in flight. 

The tails of quadrupeds, both oviparous and viviparous, 
appear, in many cases, to act in some degree as a rudder. 
They are not only useful to those lately mentioned, that by 
the assistance of a kind of parachute, leap from tree to tree ; 
but likewise to the feline race, when they spring upon their 
prey ; the tail is then extended stifily in a right line, as if to guide 
them through the air straight to the object they have been 
watching from their lair. The long tail also of many lizards 
may, in their sinuous windings, serve some purpose connected 
with their locomotion related to the one under discussion, 
though we have not data sufiicient to speak positively on the 
subject. 

1 Loxia pyrrhula. 2 Tctrao Tctrix. 3 GraUatorcs, 

4 Palmipedes. 5 Anas acuta. Hirundo. 

7 Sterna 8 Turdus. 9 Corvus Pica. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 277 

Legs. — We are now arrived at organs (hat are the most 
perfect instruments of locomotion and prehension, organs which 
are found in their greatest perfection in the highest animal?, 
articuhited legs and arms, terminating in the most perfect in- 
strument, upon the due employment or misemploy ment of 
which the weal or woe of the whole human race, as far as se- 
cond causes are concerned, depend. 

The legs of animals may be considered generally as to their 
numberf composition, and adaptation to their functions. 

As to their number, taking the legs of vertebrated animals, 
which may be regarded, being the most perfect, as a standard 
to measure others by, we may assume that four is the most 
perfect number. Thus, in man, the highest animal, there are 
two for locomotion, and two principally for prehension. Tak- 
ing, therefore, man for the ultimate point to which all tend, 
let us see how, in this respect, the scale is formed. 

We observed in certain tribes of the Annelidans, an approach 
to jointed legs, and it should seem a link, connecting, in some 
degree, that Class with the Myriapods; with these last, there- 
fore, we may start in our consideration of articulated locomotive 
organs, and here we find a longbody moved by numerous legs, 
gradually acquired, as we have seen, with its increasing length. 
We may observe, that in the superior tribes of animals, the four 
legs being planted in pairs at each extremity of the body, the 
gradual increase of stature did not require additional props, but 
only the proportionate growth of the existing or natal legs and 
arms; but in the Myriapods, where the great increase of the 
body in length is not between the original extremities, but 
beyond them, additional supports were requisite, so that as the 
body increased in length, its Creator, in his goodness willed — 
that it might not draw its slow length along like a wounded 
snake — that it should be furnished at the same time with a 
proportionate increase in the number of its locomotive organs. 
These animals then, with respect to number of legs, may be 
regarded as at the foot of the scale, and are the furthest re- 
moved from man. 

From the Myriapods, we go to the great Crustacean host, in 
which, including the maxillary legs, the real analogue of the 
legs of Hexapods, the typical number is sixteen; and from these, 
the transition is naturally to the spiders, which have half that 
number, and from them to the insect tribes, walking only upon 
six legs. Having arrived at a hexapod type, we may obseve that 
one pair of the legs has a direction towards the head, and are lo- 
cated in the anterior segment of the trunk; and that the other 
two pairs have a direction the contrary way, towards the ab- 



278 LOCOMOTIVB AND 

domen, and are located in that part of the trunk which bears 
the wings, and of these, the last pair may be regarded as the 
representatives of the legs in man, and of the hind legs of 
quadrupeds. 

As to the composition of legs, if we take the arm and leg of 
man for the t37pe or standard with which to compare all the 
articulated organs of locomotion and prehension with which 
animals are gifted, we shall find a considerable, though not 
an entire, correspondence between them. Anatomists usually 
divide the arm, or anterior extremity, into four principal por- 
tions, namely, the shoulder-blade,^ the shoulder,^ the fore-arm,^ 
and the hand;'^ but the leg only inco three — the thigh,^ the shank,^ 
and the footJ The first of these, however, the thigh, inoscu- 
lates with the lower part of a bone, called the nameless bone,^ 
which in very young subjects forms three, named the haunch,^ 
the share-bone^^ and the hip-bone :^^ now this bone appears evi- 
dently the analogue of the shoulder-blade in the anterior leg 
or arm, and thus, admitting this, both extremities in the num- 
ber of principal parts correspond with each other. 

As the vertebra ted animals, for the most part, agree with 
their prototype in the greater articulations of their anterior and 
posterior extremities, though much modified in particular in- 
stances and for particular uses, I shall now only compare the 
legs of the great sub-kingdom of Condylopes, or invertebrated 
animals with jointed legs, with those of man, and other Mam- 
malians, and inquire how, in the above respect, they consist of 
analogous parts. 

The remarkable distinction which separates the vertebrated 
from the invertebrated animals, namely, that, in the former, 
the muscles have no external points of attachment; and, in the 
latter, with a few partial exceptions, no internal ones — must 
produce a marked difference in all parts of their several struc- 
tures, and, amongst the rest, between their organs of locomotion 
and prehension: and therefore it is not to be expected that 
they will be perfectly analagous in their composition. Thus 
in the invertebrates the parts corresponding with the fore-arm 
and shank of the vertebrates do not consist of two parallel. bones; 
the hand and the foot also are essentially different; and the 



1 Scapula. 2 Jliuncnis 

3 Cubitus, including two parallel bones, the Ulna and Radius. 

4 Manus. 5 Fcwur. 
C Cnis, includini^ also two parallel bones, Tibia and Fibula. 

7 Pes. 8 Os invonmiatum. '' ^'-' ''""" 

10 Os pubis n Os ischium. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 279 

parts by which the extremities m one case articulate with the 
vertebral cohimii towards its summit and base, and in the 
other with the trunk of the animal at various points, are usually 
extremely dissimilar: \n several beetles, however, the basilar 
joints, especially of the hind legs, assume something of the 
character and form of the shoulder-blade of Mammalians; and 
in certain water-beetles^ the posterior pair are immovable. In 
quadrupeds, usually, the thighs are remarkably clothed with 
muscle, especially towards their base ; but, in the Condylopes, 
with tlie exception of some beetles and jumping insects, where 
a powerful muscular apparatus was requisite, they are not 
conspicuously incrassated, so as to contain muscles of great 
volume. 

From these circumstances I am induced to confine my ob- 
servations to the numerical composition of the locomotive and 
prehensory organs of Condylopes, and animals that give suck 
to their young. 

In order to perceive clearly how far they agree or disagree 
in this respect, it will be advisable first to inquire whether 
these organs in Condylopes themselves can be reduced to a 
common type. 

The Crustaceans and Arachnidans, including under the 
latter denomination all regarded by Latreille as belonging to 
the Class, at the first inspection of the organs in question, 
appear to have one joint more than insects. This supernu- 
merary joint is the fourth, in The Introduction to Entomology 
named the Epicnemis,^ which is there regarded as an accessory 
of the shank. But from further observation, and from a com- 
parison of this joint of the Arachnidans with an analogous one 
in the Crustaceans, in which it is longer and more conspicuous, 
I feel convinced that, short as it is in them, it is really the shank 
in that Class, and that the long joint usually regarded as the 
shank is analogous to the first, often dilated and elongated,' 
joint of the tarsus in insects. That this joint belongs to the 
tarsus or foot will be further evident from the following cir- 
cumstance. If we examine the anterior leg, or arm, of the 
lobster or crab, we shall find that the joint in question, which 
is the fifth of the leg,* is what is called the metacarpal joint, a 
process of which forms the index or finger of the'didactyje hand 
or forceps of these animals, and the succeeding and lerminal 
joint the opposing thumb. It is evident, therefore, that this 

1 Dytiscus. L. 2 Vol. iii. 6G8. 

3 E. G. In the Bees and many other Hymcnoptera. 

4 Plate X. Fio. 1. 



280 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

joint belongs not to the shank or cubit, but to the foot; and 
that consequently a Crustacean or Arachnidan leg or arm nu- 
iTierically corresponds in its greater articulations with that of 
an insect. 

Having proved, I hope, to the satisfaction of the reader, that 
the legs of Condylopes, with regard to the number of their 
[)rincipal articulations are reducible to one type, — unless we 
ma}'^ except some of the Acaridans, or mites, and the Branckiopod 
Entomostracans, which appear reducible to no general rule — I 
shall next endeavour to show that the Condylope leg does not 
usually differ numerically fiom that of the quadruped or mam- 
malian; and that the former consists of only /oitr principal arti- 
culations as well as the latter, and it will not require many 
words, or any laboured disquisition, to prove this. The, so 
called, trochanter is, with great propriety, considered by M. 
Latreille as being a joint of the thigh, as it really is, and in 
many cases, especially in Coleopterous insects, has no separate 
motion; consequently if this opinion be admitted, the number 
of articulations, both in the Condylopes and Mammalians will 
be the same. 

Animals that are built upon a skeleton, or incased in an ex- 
ternal crust or rigid integument, in order to have the power of 
free locomotion and prehension, |must necessarily be fitted with 
jointed organs, whose articulations are more numerous at the 
extremity, where the principal action is, that those parts may 
so apply to surfaces as to enable the animal to take sufficient 
hold of them for either of the above purposes. 

There is a circumstance connected with the legs of insects 
which, at first sight, seems to throw some doubt upon this con- 
clusion. The shank has often at its apex, and sometimes the 
cubit, certain little movable organs, which have been called 
spurs, but which really appear to aid the animal in its locomo- 
tions,* and in some they even terminate in suckers:^ as these 
organs are co-ordinate with the jointed tarsus, they seem in 
some sort a kind of auxiliary digitation. In the mole-cricket^ 
the structure is still more anomalous, the cubit terminating in 
four strong digitations or claws, opposed to which is the, so 
called, tarsus, which seems analogous in some sort to a jointed 
thumb, so that the whole represents a pentadactyle hand. A 
similar anomaly distinguishes the posterior pair of legs of one 
of the Entomostracans, the king-crab: in these, besides the 

1 Introd. to Ent. Vu. 074. 

2 Philos. Trails. lSl(),t.x\x.f. S, 9. 3 (ht/llotnJpa. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 281 

tarsus armed with two claws, there are four movable digita- 
tions.* 

Though the Creator has evidently connected the sphere of 
animals by some organs or characters common to the whole, 
and generally speaking, in the tribes that we are comparing, 
has formed the organs wliich I am considering, as to their 
articulations, upon a common type ; yet occasionally we see 
departures from a strict adherence to the likeness, as in the 
cases here specified, where the circumstances and functions of 
an animal required such departure. 

Adaptation of Legs. — It is by the adaptation of its legs to the 
circumstances of an animal, and to the functions which it was 
created to exercise, that tlie design of an Intelligent Cause is 
apparent, and the power, wisdom, and goodness of the Creator 
manifested. 

The well known adage, J^atura nonfacit saltus, is exemplified 
in the passage, with respect to their locomotive organs, from 
the expansile Annelidans to the rigid Condylopes ; for in num- 
berless instances, we have in the larvae of insects a kind of in- 
termediate animal, in some degree expansile, some of which 
move like the leech,^ and others are apodes, like worms, mov- 
ing by the contortions of their bodies, a large proportion at the 
same time having the jointed legs of their Class when arrived 
at perfection, and in their spurious legs imitating, in some sort, 
the locomotive organs of the Annelidans. 

The principal offices of legs are to enable the animal to 
procure the kind of food which its nature requires; to be em- 
ployed in operations connected with the continuation of its 
kind; and to be instrumental in its escape from danger and 
from the pursuit of its enemies; and the means by which these 
ends are accomplished are the comparative length of its legs; 
their volume, either in whole or in part; the structure of their 
extremity, either for locomotion or prehension ; or where the ex- 
tremity of the legs is not adapted to the latter function, certain 
compensating contrivances calculated to supply that want. 

To enable some animals to come at their food, sometimes a 
great difference, as to measure, between their anterior and pos- 
terior extremities, is necessary. At the first blush, and before 
we were acquainted with its habits, should we chance to meet 
with a giraffe,^ so striking is the seeming disproportion of maiiy 
of its parts, that we should be tempted to take it for an abortion 

1 Savigny, Anim. sans Vertcbr. i. t. viii./. 1. k, 

2 The Geometric caterpillars or loopers. 

3 Camelopardalis Giraffa. 

LL 



282 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

in which the posterior parts were not fully developed. Ob- 
serving its length of neck and elevated withers, the apparently 
unnatural declivity of its back, and the comparative lowness of 
its hind quarters, we should conclude that such must be the 
case. But if we proceeded to inquire into the nature of its 
food, and were told that it subsisted by cropping the branches 
of certain trees which thus it was enabled to reach, the trulh 
would flash upon us, we should immediately perceive the cor- 
respondence between its structure and its food, and acknowledge 
the design and contrivance of a benevolent Creator in this for- 
mation. 

A similar idea would perhaps occur to us the first time we 
saw a jerboa,^ or a kanguroo.^ Hasselquist says of the former — 
that it might be described as having the head of a hare, the 
whiskers of a squirrel, the snout of a hog, the body, ears, and 
fore-legs of a mouse, hind-legs like those of a bird, with the tail 
of a lion; and an ancient zoologist would have made a mon- 
ster of it that might have rivalled the chimsera. The kanguroo 
also would have met with a similar fate. Though the jerboa is 
not a marsupian animal like the kanguroo, yet they have many 
characters in common. They both have very slender fore- 
quarters, and short and slender fore-legs; their hind-quarters, 
on the contrary, are remarkably robust and incrassated, and 
they sit erect, resting upon them like a hare ; both have a long 
powerful tail, which they use as a fifth leg. The object of this 
formation, at the first glance, so at variance with all ideas of 
symmetry, appears to be a swifter change of place, and more 
ready escape from annoyance or violence. The jerboa is stated 
to take very long leaps, and those of the kanguroo are said to 
extend from twenty to twenty-eight feet, and they rise to an 
elevation of from six to eight feet. When they leap they keep 
their short fore-leg pressed close to their breast, and their long 
and robust tail, having first assisted them in their leap, is ex- 
tended in a right line. A double end is answered by their 
pecuhar structure; sitting on their haunches, they can leisurely 
look around them, and if they spy any cause of alarm make 
off by the means just stated. Their attenuated fore-quarters 
and short fore-legs rendering it much more easy for them, over- 
stepping every obstacle, to dart into the air ; their centre of 
gravity is then removed nearer tlie hind quarters, so that the 
tail can act as a counterpoise to the anterior part of the body. 

The jerboa also, hke the kanguroo, when alarmed, springs 
into the air. AVhcn ready to take flight, it stands, as it were, 

1 Dipus. 2 Macropus. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 283 

on tip-toe, supporting itself by its tail. Its fore-legs are then 
applied so closely to the breast as to be invisible, whence the 
ancients call it Dipus, or biped ;^ having taken their spring they 
alight upon their fore-feet, and elevating themselves again, 
they are offso rapidly, that they seem to be always, so to speak, 
upon the wing. They use their long tail to support themselves 
when they recover from their leaps, giving it the curvature of 
the letter S reversed, thus, m . When their tail has been short- 
ened at different lengths, it has been found that their leap is 
diminished in the same proportion ; and when it was wholly 
cut off they could not leap at all. 

We see, in one Order of the Birds,^ the Waders, a remarkable 
disproportion of the legs to those of the rest of the Class ; they 
look as if they w^alked upon stilts, whence the name of the 
Order, so disproportionally long are their legs to those of the 
generahty of birds. I have before noticed the use of these legs 
to them in flying,^ but the principal object of this structure is 
to enable them to prey upon aquatic animals, fishes, worms, and 
the like. Whoever is in the habit of frequenting estuaries, and 
other waters, will generally see some of these birds, as herons 
and bitterns, standing in them, where shallow, and ever and 
anon dipping their heads, and then emerging swallow their 
capture. The design of this structure must be obvious to every 
eye, namely, to qualify these birds of prey to assist in keeping 
within due limits the population of the various waters of our 
globe, which other predaceous animals cannot come at. 

Another tribe of long legged birds, which Cuvier considers as 
belonging to the present Order, though their habits and habitat 
are altogether different, and which constitute his family of 
short-winged waders,* is that to which the Ostrich^ and Emu^ 
belong, but in these the object of this structure is to fit them not 
for standing in the water, but for running in the sandy desert; 
and such is the velocity of the ostrich that it can outstrip the 
fleetest Arabian courser when pursued. Other birds are re- 
markable for the shortness and strength of their legs; of this 
description are the aquiline race, which are thus fitted by their 
Creator for seizing and holding fast any prey which their 
piercing sight discovers. 

1 Herodot. Mclpon. § 192. Ed. Reizii. 

2 It is to be observed in general, with respect to the Class of Birds, that 
the conspicuous part of their legs is not the shank, which is chiefly covered 
by muscle and feathers,but is formed of the tarsal and metatarsal bones united 
into one. 

3 See above, p. 276 4 Echassiers hrevipennes. 
5 Struthio Camelus. 6 Casuarius Emeu. 



284 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

There is one, and a very elegant bird, belonging to this Or- 
der, the secretary-bird,* the legs of which are so long, that many 
ornithologists have arranged it with the waders. It is, however, 
very properly placed amongst the predaceous birds. Its long 
legs are given it to enable it to pursue the serpents, which form 
its food. We see, in this instance, a departure from one of the 
typical characters of its own tribe, and those of another adopted 
in order to accommodate the animal to the circumstances in 
which it was the Divine will to place it, and to fit it for the 
function which it was there to exercise. 

Amongst the Reptiles there is little diversity, as to the rela- 
tive proportions of the organs we are considering, and their 
parts ; in the Batrachians, or frogs and toads, which are mostly 
leaping and swimming animals, the hind legs are elongated to 
accommodate them to those kinds of locomotion ; and in some 
of the Saurians or lizards, which are approaching to the Ophi- 
dians or serpents, the legs are very short,^ and sometimes re- 
duced to a single pair f even in some serpents rudiments of a 
pair of legs have been discovered, particularly in the Boa.^ 

Someinsects are remarkable for the vast length of their ante- 
rior pair of legs ; what may be the object of this formation has 
not been discovered except that, in one instance,^ it is found 
only in one sex. The animal I allude to belongs to the tribe 
of Capricorn beetles,^ and seems not to be uncommon in Brazil. 
The fore-legs of the male are more than twice the length of 
the body, while those of the female, though longer than the 
others, are scarcely half so long. 

Many insects are formed, in some degree, after the pattern 
of the kanguroo and the jerboa, in order to enable them to 
transport themselves by leaping beyond the reach of their ene- 
mies. The thighs of their hind legs are incrassated so as to 
afford a box capable of containing muscles sufficiently power- 
ful, by their action, to send them through the air to an almost 
incredible distance. If we examine the sructure of the poste- 
rior legs of any common grasshopper, we immediately see, both 
from the position of the joints with respect to each other, and 
the shape and volume of the elongated thigli, that they are 
made for leaping. The shank, when the animal prepares to 
leap, forms an acute angle with the thigh, so that being sud- 
denly unbent, it springs forward, often to the distance of two 
hundred times its own length. Many carriages are set upon 

1 Ophiothcres cristatus. Veill. 2 E. G. in Scps. 

3 As in Jiipcs. 4 Zool. Joum. iii. 251V 

5 Acfocinus longimanus. 6 Cerambyx. L. 



PREIIENSORY ORGANS. 285 

springs made to imitate the position of this insect preparing lo 
leap, which are known by tlie name of grasshopper springs.* 

Several beetles rival the grasshoppers in their leaps, and have 
their posterior tliighs much disproporlioned to the bulk of their 
bodies, which allow space for a sufficient muscular apparatus, 
to send them, like an arrow from a bow, to a great distance. 
If a finger be held to a leaf covered by the turnip Jiea,^ in the 
twinkhng of an eye, all skip off and vanish. We may hence 
imagine with what expedition they disappear at the approach 
of any insectivorous bird. Thus their Creator, who cares for 
the meanest of his creatures, has furnished them with means 
of escape, to prevent their annihilation, and to preserve them 
in such force, as may best answer his end in creating them. 

But besides partial modifications of the structure of these or- 
gans for particular uses, others are more general and affect the 
whole leg. Every one is aware how well adapted, by their 
fleetness, some of the Ruminant Mammalians are to make their 
escape from their ravenous pursuers, the most adroit and the 
most ruthless of which is the mighty hunter, man. 

If we look at the legs and hoofs of the deer tribe,^ the former 
long, slender, and elastic ; and the latter calculated for sure 
footing ; and if we consider besides the quickness of their senses 
of seeing and hearing, we see at once that their structure is 
the effect of design, and that the deepest intellect presided at 
its first fabrication.* Though man, as well as every ferocious 
beast, pursues these beautiful and elastic animals, it is only 
because he is GuIcb deditus, seldom with any view to seek their 
alliance, or to turn them to his purposes. There are some, 
however, as well as the rein-deer,^ cherished by the Laplander 
as his principal treasure, but pursued by the American savage 
only to be devoured, which probably might be employed with 
advantage, as well as the dog, in countries not suited to our 
beasts of burthen ; and it has been supposed that the Wapiti^ 
might be trained and rendered useful, I am ignorant, however, 
whether any steps have ever been taken to ascertain this. 

But the legs, as well as instruments of flight and escape, are 
adapted in fiercer animals to the pursuit and prehension of 
their prey, and in this, and many other respects, their hand or 

1 See Introduction to Entomology^ ii. 310. 

2 Haltica oleracea, JVemorunif &c. 3 Cervtts. L. 

4 See Roget, B. T. i. 500. 5 Cervus Tarandus. 

6 C Stongyloceras. 



286 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

foot is the part principally interesting. This is used for fo 
many various purposes, that perhaps it will be best to lake a 
summary survey, in this respct, of all the Classes of animals 
with articulated legs, and briefly point at their different struc- 
tures and their uses. 

As I have already given an account of the two kinds of forceps 
of Crustaceans/ 1 shall begin with the legs of the Arachnidans, 
or spiders. Every one who examines the web of a common 
spider, whether it is formed of concentrip circles supported by 
diverging rays, or whether it imitates any finely woven sub- 
stance, will be convinced that she must be furnished wiih a 
peculiar set of organs to effect these purposes : that she must 
have something like a hand to work with. Amongst the small 
things that are wise upon earth, Solomon mentions the spider; 
and the way by which he tells us she shows her wisdom is by 
her prehensory powers — she takes hold with her hands.^ And 
truly what Arachne does with her hands and her spinning or- 
gans is very wonderful, as I shall have occasion hereafter to 
show ; I shall now only make a few observations upon the or- 
gans by which she takes hold. 

Spiders are gifted with the faculty of walking against gravity, 
even upon glass, and in a prone position. According to the 
observations of Mr Blackwall, this is not effected by producing 
atmospheric pressure by the adhesion of suckers, but by a brush 
formed of " slender bristles fringed on each side with exceed- 
ing fine hairs gradually diminishing in length as they approach 
its extremity, where they occur in such profusion as to form a 
thick brush on its inferior surface."^ These brushes he first 
discovered on a living specimen of the hird-spider^* and the 
same structure, as far as his researches were carried, he found 
in those spiders which can walk against gravity and up glass. 
This is one of the modes by which they take hold with their 
hands, and thus they ascend walls, and set their snares in the 
palace as well as the cottage. Whoever examines the under- 
side of the last joint or digit of the foot of this animal with a 
common pocket-lens, will see that it is clothed with a very 
thick brush, the hairs of which, under a more powerful mag- 
nifier, appear somewhat hooked at the apex ; in some species 
this brush is divided longitudinally, so as to form two. 

But the organs that are more particularly connected with 
the weaving and structure of the snares of the spiders are most 

1 See above, p. 208, 200. 2 Prov. xxx. 28. 

3 Blackwall in IJmi. Trans, xvi. 481. t. xxx'x.f. r>. 

4 My gale avicuUiria. 



PREHEiNSORY ORGANS. 287 

worthy of aUeniion. Setting aside the hunters\ and others 
that weave no snares to entrap their prey, I shall consider 
those I intend to notice, under the usual names of weavers^ and 
retlaries.^ 

Before Mr Black wall turned his attention to the proceedings 
of these ingenious and industrious animals, it had not been 
ascertained, in what respect their modes of spinning their webs, 
and the organs by which they formed their respective manu- 
factures dillered. But JNlr Blackwall, whose observations were 
principally made upon one of the weavers* which frequents the 
holes and cavities of walls, and similar places, observes that it 
spins a kind of web of different kinds of silk, the surface of 
which has a llocky appearance, from the web being as it were 
ravelled. 

This web is produced, he observes, by a double series of 
spines, opposed to each other, and planted on a prominent ridge 
of the upper side of the metatarsal joint, or that usually re- 
garded as the first joint, of the foot of the posterior legs on the 
side next the abdomen. These spines are employed by the 
animal as a carding apparatus, the low series combing, as it 
were, or extracting, the ravelled web from the spinneret,* and 
the upper series, by the insertion of its spines between those of 
the other, disengaging the web from them.^ By this curious 
operation, which it is not easy to describe clearly, the adhesive 
part of the snare is formed, thus large flies are easily caught 
and detained, which the animal, emerging from its conceal- 
ment, soon despatches and devours. 

The organs by which the retiary spiders form their curious 
geometric snares have generally been described as three claws, 
the two uppermost armed with parallel teeth like a comb, and 
the lower one simple and often depressed ; but Mr Blackwall 
found, in a species related to the common garden spider,'^ eight' 
claws, seven of which had their lower side toothed.^ The 
object of this complex apparatus of claws simple and pectinated, 
is to enable these animals to take hold of any thread; to guide 
it; to pull it ; to draw it out; to ascertain the nature of any 
thing ensnared, wheiher it be animate or inanimate; and to 
suspend itself. In fact the Creator has made their claws not 
only hands but eyes to these animals. 

1 £rane(B. venatoritB. 2 A. textorice. 

3 A. retiarice. 4 Clubiona atrox. 

5 MammulcB. 6 Blackwall, Mii^?/:/^. 473. 

7 Epeira Diadema. The species examined by Mr B. was E. apodisa. 

8 Blackwall, ubi sup. 476. 



288 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

Besides these organs, scattered movable spines or spurs are 
observable upon the legs, especially the three last joints, which 
I consider as forming the foot, but sometimes also upon the 
thighs of spiders, which, as they can be elevated and depressed 
at the will of the animal, probably are used as a kind of finger, 
when occasions require it. 

In th^ multiform apparatus of these ingenious animals, as 
far as we understand its use, we see how the}^ are fitted for 
their office, by contributing to deliver mankind from a plague 
of flies, which would otherwise, like those which swarmed in 
Egypt, annoy us beyond teleration, and corrupt our land. 

If the spider taketh hold loith her hands, and spreads her snare 
in kings' palaces, what shall we say of the bee, who with her 
hands erects herself her many-storied palaces, each story con- 
sisting of innumerable chambers, far more durable, and built 
of a materal infinitely exceeding the flimsy webs of Arachne. 
Her Creator hath instructed her, and fitted her with the means, 
to gather from every flower that blows a pure and sweet nec- 
tar, from which, received into her stomach, she elaborates the 
beautiful and important product of which her wondrous struc- 
tures are formed ; and from the same source she is also instructed 
to load herself with a fine ambrosial dust, which, kneaded by 
her into a paste, constitutes the chief subsistence of herself 
and the young of the community to which she belongs. 

Almost every organ, implanted in her frame by her benefi- 
cent Creator, is employed by this symbol and exemplar of vir- 
tuous industry as a hand in her several works and manipula- 
tions. Her antennce, those still mysterious organs, inform her 
in what flowers she may find honey, and which to pass by; 
they plan and measure her work, and by them she examines 
whether all is right; she also uses them to converse with her 
associates, and for various other purposes ; her tongue is like- 
wise an instrument equally useful to her ; it can assume vari- 
ous shapes as occasions demand ; it collects the honey from 
the nectar-organs of the flower ; it tempers the wax for build- 
ing and prepares it for the action of the mandibles. With these 
last organs she works up the wax till it is fit for use. The 
plumy hairs of her body, especiall}'^ in the humble-bees, are 
useful in detaining the dust of the anthers. Her legs, more 
particularly the posterior pair, though not used innnediately 
in her structures, are extremely important organs, both for pre- 
paring her food and the material with which she builds her 
palace. At the junction of (he shank, with the first joint of 
the foot of this pair, a kind o( forceps is formed, by (he angle 
at the apex of the former and the base of the hitler, with which 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 289 

the bee takes a plate of wax from tlie wax-pockets under lier 
abdomen, and delivers it to tbe anterior pair of legs, by which 
it is submitted to tlie action of tlie mandibles. The shanks of 
the posterior legs likewise on their upper side have a cavity 
surrounded with hairs, which form a kind of basket, in which 
the diligent labourer carries a mass of pollen, kneaded by the 
aid of the comb at the end of the shank into a paste, which is 
deposited in the cells, and contributes to form the family store 
of provision. 

What a number of compensating contrivances does this sin- 
gle animal exhibit, and how wonderfully and admirably has 
Supreme Wisdom and Goodness contrived for her, and Al- 
mighty Power given full elfect to what they planned! Noth- 
ing is superfluous in her, every hair and every angle has its 
use ; so that well may we adore Him who created the honey- 
bee, and, at whose bidding, and by whose instruction, she erects 
those wonderful edifices that have been the admiration of every 
age.^ 

Instinct directs many animals, as well as traversing the sur- 
face of the earth, to seek a subterranean abode within its 
bosom. Amongst insects, though there are many that burrow, 
none is more remarkable than the mole-cricket.'^ The most su- 
perficial observer, when he looks at this creature, must see at 
once from its structure, especially that of its fore-legs, what its 
function is. If he compares other crickets with it, a singular 
change will strike him, the bulk of the posterior thighs, far ex- 
ceeding that of the same joint in the other legs, will appear to 
be chiefly transferred to the anterior pair of legs, which, the 
size of the creature considered, are as powerful instruments for 
excavating the earth as can be found in any animal now in 
existence : all the joints of this leg are very much dilated, 
especially the haunch and the thigh, which contain the power- 
ful muscles that move the apparatus for burrowing. This con- 
sists of a triangular joint, the analogue of the shank of the other 
legs, but assuming the form of a hand with the palm turned 
outwards, as in the mole, and terminating in four strong claw- 
like digitations ; on the side next the head these fingers, in 
the middle, are longitudinally elevated and naked ; while the 
sides are longitudinally excavated and hairy, which give this 
part some resemblance to the foot and claws of burrowing 
quadrupeds. The thigh is hollowed out underneath, evidently 
to receive the joint just described, and overhanging this cavity, 
at the base, is a stout triangular tooth, which probably is em- 

1 See Bochart Hierozoic. ii. 515. a. 9 GnjUotalpa, 

MM 



290 LOCOMOTIVE AXD 

ployed to clean the hand when necessary ; on the outside op- 
posed to the band is the analogue of the tarsus consisting of 
three joints, the two first large and triangular, with the upper 
edge curved and the lower straight and hairy at the base, the 
other is of the ordinary form, and armed with two straight 
claws. These teeth, as well as those of the shank, have a 
trenchant edge on the straight side, and together are supposed 
to act the part of a pair of shears, nnd to cut any roots that 
may interfere with its progress. Rosel, however, thinks, the 
use of these teeth of the tarsus is merely to clean the burrow- 
ing hand, which it may also do. It is to be observed that the 
trenchant edge is opposite in the teeth of the shank and tarsus, 
as in a pair of scissors, which favours the idea that they are used 
sometimes for cutting. The position of the shank is vertical, 
with the teeth next the ground, so that the animal, when dis- 
posed to burrow, has nothing to do but to plunge these claws 
into the soil and push outwards, and then extricating her arms 
proceed in the same way till she has accomplished her object. 
The apex of the shanks, of the two posterior pairs of legs, is 
armed with several spines which probably assist either in 
making progress, or, when necessary, to retrograde. 

" It might, I think, be asserted," observes Dr Kidd, in his 
valuable and interesting memoir On the anatomy of the mole- 
cricket,^ "without fear of contradiction, that throughout the 
whole range of animated nature, there is not a stronger in- 
stance of what may be called intentional structure, than is 
afforded by that part of the mole-cricket {the anterior leg), which 
I am now to describe." And certainly, we see and own with- 
out hesitation, as even the most sceptical would scarcely refuse 
doing, that this arm was planned, and all its various parts, de- 
pendent upon and mutually affecting each other, by a calcu- 
lating Mind, which framed and put the whole together to an- 
swer a particular purpose. 

The Class of reptiles affords no very striking instances of the 
adaptations we are considering, except in the case before no- 
ticed of the gecko lizards, and the tree-frogs,^ which, by means 
of suckers, are enabled to support themselves and walk against 
gravity. Like Mammalians, reptiles are usually furnished, but 
not invariably, with four legs, and a pentadactyle foot. 

In an animal of this Class, celebrated from of old, the Cha- 
meleon,^ a remarkable modification of this structure is observa- 
ble. It is stated with respect to this animal, that it moves 
very slowly, that it will sometimes remain whole days on the 

1 PW«.v. Twri.t. 1S2r»,217. 2 Hi/In. A Chmmrlfo Jifrirnvvs,&c 



PREHENSORV ORGANS. 291 

same branch : and it is only with great circumspection, and 
after taking great care to get jfirm hold with its prehensile tail, 
that it ventures to set a few steps: it may be expected, there- 
fore, that its principal organs of locomotion should be adapted 
to give it secure footing on the branch it selects for its station. 
Aristotle, in his account of this animal,* observes that "each 
of its feet is divided into two parts, an arrangement resembhng 
that of our thumb, opposed to the rest of the hand; and a little 
short of this,^ each of these parts is divided into certain fingers; 
in the fore-legs the internal ones being three, and the external 
tvvo,^ but in the hind the internal fingers are three, and the ex- 
ternal two,"* and these fingers have crooked claws." By this 
structure of the feet, and arrangement of the fingers or toes, 
the three-toed lobe is on one side of the branch at the anterior 
extremity of the animal, and on the other at the posterior, and 
by this counteraction of each other's pressure, enable it to main- 
tain its position against any force that may be likely to disturb 
it. The lobes are longer than the fingers, and thus by their 
means it can hold very firmly, and watch the flies and insects 
which form its food, and are entrapped by the gluten with 
which its long tongue is besmeared. 

The analogue of the fore-leg of quadrupeds in birds, as we 
have seen, is converted into an organ of flight, and cannot be 
employed as an organ of prehension ; sometimes, indeed, in 
their combats, it is used to annoy their opponents, and is occa- 
sionally armed with a spur, but the prehensory faculty is 
transferred to the beak and the remaining pair of legs; with 
these latter the eagles and other birds of prey usually seize the 
animals that they devour; with these also fructivorous birds, 
as the parrots, paroquets, &c. hold tlie fruit while they eat.it, 
and the Gallinaceous Order scratch the earth to find food for 
themselves and chicks; the foot of birds is most commonly 
tetradactyle, with one toe or thumb at the heel and the other 
three in front; in one Order,* the birds forming which have 
occasion to fix themselves firmly on their perch, the thumb and 
the external toe both point backwards, so as to form a cross 
with the others and the rest of the leg. In the emu the foot 
consists of three toes, and in the ostrich of only two, there being 
no thumb in either. Many of the aquatic birds have the toes 

1 Aristot. Hist. Anim. 1. ii. c. 11 . 

2 Gr.^E;r/ ,/3§i;t"' Meaning, T suppose, that the toes are not so long as 
the primary division of the foot. 

3 Plate XIV. Fig. 2 4 Ihid. Fig. 3. 6 Scansores. 



292 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

connected by membrane, and so forming oars for swimming; 
and in some each toe has a margin of membrane, which is 
usually notched, these last are called lobed feet. 

But the absence of the fore-leg in birds is admirably com- 
pensated by the beak; with this they generally colled, as well 
as devour their food. Some indeed employ their tongue in this 
service. Of this description is the woodpecker^ and the hum- 
ming Bird f the former using it to catch insects^ and the latter 
to imbibe the nectar of flowers, for which purpose these little 
gems amongst the birds have a long slender tongue, somewhat 
resembling that of a butterfly, and moved by an apparatus, in 
some degree, like that of the woodpecker.* The beak of birds 
is uniformly constructed with respect to their food, and varies 
ad infinitum. Perhaps in none is it more remarkable than in 
those of Cuvier's two last Orders, the waders and web-footed 
birds. These, especially the last, can use their legs only for 
locomotion, either on shore or in the water, and therefore their 
beaks have the whole function, not only of taking, but of hunt- 
ing for food devolved upon them, and accordingly are fitted for 
it by their structure.^ Generally speaking, they may be stated 
to be of two kinds. Beaks for catching worms, and beaks for 
catching ^s/ies; of the first description are those of the wood- 
cock,^ snipes,' and numerous other waders; and of the last, 
amongst the most remarkable, are those of the spoonbill^ and 
pehcan.^ The former — which the French, perhaps with more 
propriety, call the spatula-bill, ^° as its beak resembles a spatula 
rather than a spoon — dabble with their bill in the mud, for 
which it is well calculated, and thus capture small fishes, 
shell-fish, reptiles, and other aquatic and amphibious animals, 
which the tubercles within it are also calculated to retain and 
crush. But the latter, the pelican, has the most remarkable 
organ for taking its food, and is a bird known and celebrated 
from the earliest ages. The lower mandible is fitted with a 
kind of sac, formed of the dilated skin of the throat, which 
Vieillot says can be so expanded as to contain between two 
and three gallons of water." When fishing, these birds some- 
times rise to a prodigious height, at others they skim the sur- 
face of the water, or hover, at a moderate elevation, that they 

1 Picus. 2 Trochilus. 

3 See Dr Rogct, B. T. ii. 132, 

4 See Vieillot. JV. D. D'JIist. JViit. vii. 342. t. B. 38. 

5 Roget, jB. T. ii. 391. (> Scolopax rusliroln. 
7 Sc. ^allinairo, and ffallimda. 8 PI a (aha hucorodiu 
9 Pelccanus Onoc.rotalus. JO Spaltdc. 

11 JV. D. D'llist. Nat. xxv. 139. 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 293 

may more readily precipitate themselves upon their prey. The 
sudden fall of so powerful an animal, the whirling round, the 
boiling which the great extent of its wings occasions in the 
water, so astounds and stuns the fishes that few escape. Then 
rising again and again descending, it continues this manoeuvre 
till it has filled its pouch. When this is accomplished it retires 
to some rocky eminence where it devours what it has caught, 
which sometimes, Vieillot says, will amount to as many fishes 
as would satisfy six men.^ It presses its pouch against its 
breast when it feeds its young, in order to disgorge the fishes, 
whence probably arose the fable of its feeding them with its 
own blood. 

But the beak is not only used by birds in collecting their 
food, some also it assists in climbing; parrots are remarkable for 
this, and also employ their tail for the same purpose. 

Truly, when we examine and compare all these organs of 
prehension as well as manducation, and the infinite modifica- 
tions of them, to suit the peculiar kind of food and circum- 
stances of every tribe, we cannot help exclaiming — God is 
here, we behold the evident footsteps of infinite wisdom, power, 
and goodness. Well might our Saviour say, Behold the fowls 
of the air ; for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into 
barns ; yet your Heavenly Father feedeth them.^ 

The legs of Mammalians, with respect to their extremity, 
may be considered as divided into those that have powers of 
prehension, more or less, and those that have only powers of 
locomotion. I shall begin with the latter. 

1. These consist of Baron Cuvier's seventh and eighth Orders 
of the Class above mentioned ; namely, the Pachyderms, or 
thick skinned beasts, and the Ruminants, or those that chew 
the cud. 

The great man, just named, considers the horse and ass, 
constituting the equine genus,^ as forming a Family of the 
first of these Orders, to which he has given the ancient appel- 
lation of Soliped,'^ or whole-hoofed. He originally regarded 
the Sohpeds as formiftg a separate Order, and, indeed, com- 
paring them with the other Pachyderms, as the elephant, rhi- 
noceros, hippopotamus, hog, &c., the horse genus seems 
scarcely to belong to the same order. Illiger, who altered the 
name, but without sufficient reason, to Solidungula, considers 
them as distinct. 

I Ubi supr. 138. 2 Matth. vi. 26. 

3 Equus. 4 Gr. Moyy|. Aristot. 



294 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

Though the speed of the deer, except in a single instance, 
on account of their usually slight form and slender limbs, has 
not been applied by man to his purposes, and to add to the 
velocity of his progress, yet in the soliped race, especially in 
that noble quadruped the horse, we have an animal endowed 
with equal speed and greater strength, and by their undivided 
hoof, where speed as w^ell as strength is required, calculated, 
with much more advantage and less injury, to traverse — both 
as beasts of burthen and draft, and as adapted peculiarly for 
the conveyance of man himself — not only soft and verdant 
prairies, but hard and rocky roads. Hence this animal has 
been employed by man from a very early period of society. 
We do not indeed know whether the mighty hunter, Nimrod, 
went to the chase of man and beast on horseback, though it is 
not improbable ; but both the horse and the ass were common 
in Egypt in Joseph's time,^ the latter was used by Abraham 
to ride upon,^ and asses are enumerated amongst his posses- 
sions when he went up from Egypt fifty years before.^ 

The sole organs of prehension of this tribe are their mouth 
and upper lip. Every one knows how adroit the horse and ass 
often become in the use of these organs, not only in gathering 
their food, but in opening gates that confine them to their pas- 
tures. 

In the genuine Pachyderms the foot begins to show marks 
of division. In the rhinoceros there are three toes, in the hip- 
popotamus four, and in the Proboscidians of Cuvier, including 
the elephant and Mastodon, or fossil elephant, there are five 
toes, three of the nails of which only appear externally, and 
four on the hind foot of the Asiatic species.* 

The Swine family divide the hoof like the Ruminant ; it 
consists of two intermediate toes, large, and armed with nails or 
hoofs, and two lateral ones much shorter and not touching the 
ground ; in this respect also resembling many Ruminants. In 
hilly and mountainous districts these upper toes are probably 
useful in locomotion. 

The prehensory organ of the animals here enumerated is 
usually the snout, with this the hog^ turns up the ground in 
search of roots or grubs, often doing great injury to pastures. 
The male is armed with a defensive and offensive weapon in 
his tusks. 

That hideous animal of this tribe, the Ethiopian boar,^ is 
armed with four tusks, two proceeding from the upper jaw, 

1 Genes, xlvii. 17. 2 xxii. 3. I? xii. 16 

4 E. indicus. 5 Sus scrofa. 6 Phascocharus .tfricauus . 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 295 

which turn upwards like a horn, somethnes nine inches long 
and five inches in circumference at the base ; the other pair 
issuing from the lower jaw, projecting not more than three 
inches from the mouth, flat on the inside, and corresponding 
with another plain surface in the upper tusks. The Boshies 
men, Sparrman relates, say of this animal, " We had rather 
attack a lion in the plain than an African wild boar ; for this, 
though much smaller, comes rushing on a man as swift as an 
arrow, and throwing him down snaps his legs in two, and rips 
up his belly before he can get to strike at it, and kill it with 
his javelin."^ They inhabit subterranean recesses ; and turn 
up the earth very dexterously, probably by the aid of their 
tusks, in search of roots, which form their food. 

The Babiroussa^ or Babee rooso, a name which signifies Hog- 
deer, given to this animal probably on account of its longer legs 
and slender form, is distinguished by a pair of long tusks from 
the upper jaw, which rising above the head, then turning 
down, form a semicircle, and have the appearance of horns, 
for which they have been mistaken. They are only found in 
the male, which is stated to use them as hooks to suspend 
himself to the branches of trees, thus resting his head, so as to 
sleep upright. As the animal feeds upon the leaves of the 
Banana and other trees, it is not improbable that these tusks 
may be used to pull down the branches. 

The Rhinoceros is said to use its horn for digging up the 
roots of plants, which compose the principal portion of its food. 
I am speaking of the two-horned rhinoceros of Sparrman. The 
Hottentots and the colonists assert that this animal uses only 
its second or shortest horn for digging up roots, which appeared 
to him worn by friction, marks of which the anterior one never 
exhibited. When engaged in that employment it was stated 
to turn that horn on one side^ out of the way. 

But one of the most wonderful compensating contrivances 
and structures of Divine Wisdom, Power, and Goodness, and 
which has excited the admiration of every age, is the proboscis 
of the elephant. The weight of the enormous head of this 
animal is such as to preclude its being employed, if it termi- 
nated in a common mouth, either to break the boughs of trees, 
or to crop the grass, for it could not easily be either elevated 
or depressed for these purposes ; in its proboscis, however, it is 
supplied with an instrument that amply compensates this defi- 
ciency. Almost every one is aware that this beautiful organ^ 

1 Voyage, ii. 23. 2 Sus bahyrussa. 

3 Sparrman. Voyage, ii. 98. 



296 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

beautiful I mean for its structure,* answers a variety of pur- 
poses ; that it is given by its Creator to this mighty animal to 
be to it an instrument almost of sight, of most dehcate touch, 
of scent and breathing, of prehension as adroit as that of a 
hand ; added lo this, ^hat by the extraordinary flexibihty with 
whicli he has endowed it, it can not only be inflected inwards 
to carry things to its mouth, but be bent upwards, downwards, 
or laterally, to lay hold of things above, below, or on each side 
of it, and that by the assistance of a single finger at its ex- 
tremity, it can take hold of any thing as readily as we do by 
the assistance of four fingers and a thumb. As the brain of 
these gigantic animals, compared with their bulk, is very 
small, it is thought, by modern zoologists, that their intellect 
has been exaggerated, and that it does not surpass that of dogs, 
and many other carnivorous animals. Others have imagined 
that their sagacity is wholly the result of their being provided 
with so wonderful an organ ; but this organ would be of very 
little use without the nervous apparatus by which it is moved 
according to the will of the animal. 

Amongst the Ruminants, — which appear to connect with 
the Pachyderms in two points, by the swine tribe and Solipeds, 
the latter possessing several characters in common with the 
Gnu,^ which seems between them and the bovine genus ;^ and 
the former approaching them by their common character of 
dividing the hoof, — there is another animal, which may be 
considered as the horse of the desert, exhibiting in some degree 
a union of characters not found in the remainder of the Order; 
it chews the cud, but does not actually divide the hoof. I am 
speaking of the Camel, but though not actually, the hoof is 
superficially divided. Considering the deserts of loose and 
deep sand that it often has to traverse, a completely divided 
hoof would have sunk too deep in the sand; while one entire 
below would present a broader surface not so liable to this in- 
convenience. Boys, when they want to walk upon the muddy 
shores of an estuary at low water, fasten broad boards to their 
feet, which prevent them from sinking in the mud; I conceive, 
that the ichole sole of the camel's foot answers a similar purpose : 
its superficial division probably gives a degree of pliancy to it, 
enabling it to move with more ease over the sands ; upon which 
these animals often trot with great rapidity, travelling some- 
times twelve miles within the hour; its common amble, which 
is exceedingly easy, is nearly six; this pace, if properly fed 
cvci y evening, or in cases of emergence, only once in two days, 

1 [Soffot, B T. i r/20. 2 Catoblrpas Gnu 3 Bos 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 297 

the camel will conlimie uiiiiileriuptedl}' for five or six days: 
Willi these qualities, so suiiahle to baireii and sandy deserts, 
what a valuable gift of Providence was this, especially to the 
descendants of Ishmael; who, according to the prophecy, have 
maintained undisLurbed possession of their det-arts and tiieir 
necessary accompaniment, the camel, from the time of their 
progenitor to the present day, a period of between three or four 
thousand years. They have been wild men, always assailing 
and assailed, and yet maintaining their ground. But the time 
will assuredly come, when The flocks of Kedar, and the rams of 
JsTebaiothi^ shall forsake their deeds of spoliation and robbery 
and be gathered to the church. 

Though the Ruminants, in general, by the structure and 
division of their hoof, are calculated for sure footing, so as to 
enable them best to exercise their several functions; as the 
camel, the ox, and the rein-deer at the bidding of their master 
man; and others, as the chamois and the goat, for the ascent 
of mountains and precipices, seemingly inaccessible, where 
they can laugh at their pursuer; and others again, as the deer 
and antelope tribes for speed that almost mocks pursuit ; yet 
with respect to prehension these organs are of no use to them. 
Their mouth and lips, and tongue, are the only means by 
which they can help themselves to their food; they have no 
tusks like the Pachyderms in general, nor nasal horns like the 
rhinoceros, to cut or dig with; but as their food is most com- 
monly the herbage that covers the earth, these are fully suffi- 
cient to enable them to supply themselves with Food convenient 
for them. The camel and dromedary differ from the other Ru- 
minants, not only in their long neck, which probably is useful 
to them in gathering their food, but also in having a cleft lip, 
which doubtless, adds to the prehensory powers of that organ. 
The lofty neck is still more striking in the Camelopard, the 
long tongue of which is also used by them as a hand to pull 
down the branches of the mimosa, from they derive their sub- 
sistence. 

2. I shall now consider those Mammalians, whose legs are 
more or less prehensory, next above the Pachyderms and Ru- 
minants. Cuvier's sixth Order consists of a tribe of animals 
which he denominates Edentate,^ because they have no fore- 
teeth. The Monotremes form the last Family of the Order, 
and precede the Pachyderms. In many points they seem con- 
nected with the birds ; one genus^ having a mouth resembling 
the bill of a duck, and being almost w^eb-footed ; it has also 

1 Isai. Ix 7. 2 Edentes. 3 Ornithorhynchus. 

NN 



298 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

been stated to be oviparous ;^ tiie male, as I before observed,^ is 
armed with a sting, like a serpent. The other genus, Echidna, 
approaches nearer the pangolins,^ and anteaters,'^ having, like 
them, an extensile viscid tongue, by means of which they en- 
trap and devour the ants. The other aniiTials of the Order 
are remarkable for their great nails, almost approaching to 
hoofs ; in the Family which precedes the Monotrones^ they are 
often used for burrowing. 

Next above the Echidna is a singular animal, wearing the 
outward aspect and Scales of a Saurian, the pangolin, which 
rolls itself up like an armadillo, and is the ant-eater of the old 
world. It is singular that a real lizard, the chameleon, should 
have the same instinct of catching its insect prey by means of 
a long tongue besmeared with slime. In the new world the 
pangolin is replaced by the ant-eaters, which have the same 
habits, and the same mode of procuring their food. With the 
long nails of their fore-feet they penetrate the nests of the 
w^hite ants and common ants, and inserting their long tongue, 
besmeared with a viscid saliva, into these nests, retract it co- 
vered with game; and this with such velocity, that the eye 
can scarcely follow them. Their nails, which require to be 
kept sharp, for the operation just mentioned, when not em- 
ployed, are folded inwards, so as to prevent their being blunted. 
In one species^ in the fore-foot there are only two nails. 

Amongst the animals that are clothed in armour, in this 
Order, the most remarkable is the Chlamyphonis,"^ whose feet 
are armed with five long and sharp nails, especially the ante- 
rior ones, which must enable it to excavate its subterranean 
abode very rapidly. From the formation of its foot and these 
nails it does not appear to dig with them laterally, but in a 
line with the body ; its singular clubbed tail therefore would 
be a very useful organ, if, as Mr Yarrel supposes, it is used in 
removing backwards the loose earth accumulated under its 
belly by the action of the fore-legs.^ This animal, which is a 
native of Chili, is reputed to carry its young beneath the scaly 
armour attached principally to the spine, which covers it loosely 
like a cloak. 

The last family, as we ascend, in the present Order, is very 
well distinguished by the name of Tardigradcs, from the exces- 
sive slowness of their motions. Their nails are enormously 

1 Cuv. Rhgne Anim.. i. 234, note 2. 2 See above, p. 233- 

3 Manis. 4 Mifrmccojihmra. 

5 Edcntes ordinalres. Cuv. 6 M. didactijlos. 

1 Plate XVI. 8 ZooL Journ. in. TnM 



PREHENSORT ORGANS. 299 

long, compressed, and crooked, and exactly calculated for lay- 
ing strong hold, so as to enable them to maintain their station 
on the trees, whose leaves and buds form their food. Their 
English appellation, the Sloth,^ indicates their character ; when 
they have satisfied their appetite, like most of the other Eden- 
tates, they can roll themselves up and take a long and reck- 
less sleep. But I need not enlarge further upon this tribe, 
since Dr Buckland has excellently — Justified the ways of God 
to man, — and, in the present instance, demonstrated, by most 
convincing arguments, that these animals, instead of being an 
abortion, imperfect, misshapen, and monstrous, are exactl)', 
and in every respect, adapted for the station which God has 
assigned to them, and for the work which he has given them 
in charge.^ 

Next above the Endentate Mammalians is an Order, the 
fifth of Cuvier, consisting of a greater nuniber of Genera and 
Subgenera than any other in the Class, which, instead of hav- 
ing no front teeth or incisives, have very conspicuous ones, 
rendered more so by being separated by a void space from the 
grinders. From these teeth, which are neither calculated to 
seize or lacerate their food, but merely to nibble and gnaw it, 
they have received their name of J^ibblers or Gnawers.'^ 

The great majority of this Order are gregarious, and live in 
burrows, or common habitations, which they excavate or fab- 
ricate themselves. Like the Hymenopterous Class of insects, 
many are noted for the sagacity and skill which they manifest 
in their united labours for the good of the community, and 
also for the organs by which they are enabled to answer the 
bidding of instinct. 

One of the most remarkable of these is the Beaver;^ this 
animal has five toes on all its feel, which in the hind pair are 
connected by membrane ; those of the fore-leg, which it uses 
as a hand to convey its food to its mouth, are very distinct. 
They carry also with these hands the mud and stones which 
they mix with the wooden part of their buildings. But their 
incisor teeth are their principal instruments, with these, as Dr 
Richardson states, they cut down trees as big or bigger than a 
man's thigh ; when they undertake this operation they gnaw 
it all round, cutting it sagaciously on one side higher than on 
the other, by which it is caused to fall in the direction they 
wish ; they use these powerful organs not only to fell the trees 

1 Bradypus. 2 Linn. Trans, xvii. 17. 

3 Rodentia. 4 Castor Fiber. 



300 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

they select, but also to drag them to the place where they want 
thera. It is said, tliat a beaver, when at its full strength, can 
at one stroke bite through the leg of a dog. 

It has been affirmed that^avers employ their tail both as n 
trowel to plaster their houses, and as a sledge to carry tl e 
trees that they fell ; but both these assertions seem to be built 
upon conjecture rather than observation, and are not credited 
by those who have had the best opportunities of observing their 
manners, as Hearne, Cartwright, and Dr Richardson. The 
fabrics they are taught by their Creator to erect, and impelled 
by the instinct he has implanted in them, are sufficiently won- 
derful without having recourse to fiction to exaggerate it. 
Their tails, probably, are useful to them in the water as nata- 
tory organs. 

There is a very singular animal discovered by M. Sonnerat, 
in Madagascar, called the Jlye-Aye,^ which seems, in some de- 
gree, to approach the Quadrumanes. The fore-feet have five 
excessively long fingers, and what is singular, the middle one 
is much slenderer than the rest. In the hind feet there is a 
thumb opposed to the other fingers, by which structure it is 
enabled to take firmer hold of the branches of trees. It is said 
to use the slender finger of its hand for the same purpose that 
the wood-pecker uses its barbed tongue, to extract the grubs 
from the trees. 

The squirrels, which form the first genus in this interesting 
Order, are known to use their fore-legs for prehension, which 
indeed is the case with the majority of animals included in it. 
They are also, at least a large proportion, remarkable for sitting, 
when at rest, upon their haunches, an4 also for their ready use 
of their fore-legs. 

Having before noticed the most remarkable animal in Cu- 
vier's fourth Order, the JMarsupians, which suckle their young 
in a pouch, I shall only mention one other animal belong- 
ing to it, the Koala,^ a New Holland quadruped, in some 
respects resembling the bear; like the chameleon, it has the 
five toes or fingers of the fore-foot divided into two groups, the 
thumb and fore-finger forming one, and the three remaining 
fingers the other ; the object of this structure is evidently to 
enable it to take firm hold of the branches of the trees on which 
it passes part of its life ; this is of the more importance to it, as 
it carries its young upon its back. It sometimes, probably in 

1 Chdromys. 2 Liptmis. 



• PREHENSORY ORGANS. 301 

the night, retires to burrows which it excavates at the foot of 
the trees. 

We have now arrived at the foot of Baron Cuvier's third 
Order, containing the predaceous Mammalians, which, though 
a very comprehensive group, will not detain us long, as the 
first and last family, the Bats and Sealsj have been noticed in 
another place.^ The rest of the Order consists of the insec- 
tivorous and carnivorous Mammalians ; the latter is further 
subdivided into two tribes, which are denominated the Planti- 
grades and the Dlgitigrades. 

Those last mentioned usuall}'^ walk more upon their toes, and 
consist of the fehne, canine, and several other tribes, all swift 
in their locomotions, and making use of their paws or fore-foot, 
either for scratching and burrowing, or to seize their prey, and 
they have all, I believe, five toes. 

The Plantigrades are so called because they walk, like man, 
upon the whole foot, and consist of the bear,^ the glutton,^ and 
similar animals. This structure enables the former to rear 
itself on its hind feet, and walk erect; and their fore-foot will 
grasp a staff like a hand ; it is armed with long claws, with 
which they scratch up roots which form part of their subsist- 
ence, excavate burrows, climb the trees, and seize their prey. 

These armed paws are fearful weapons, both in the lion and 
the bear, to which few would like to be exposed ; but an heroic 
youth, beloved of God and man, regarded them not when, as a 
faithful shepherd, he rescued a lamb of his father's flock from 
their grasp and voracity. 

The two most remarkable animals in the insectivorous tribe 
of predaceous Mammalians are the mole,* and the harmless, 
though persecuted hedgehog,^ but they are both too well 
known, the former for its piquants, and the latter for its hand 
turned outwards and moved by an enormous apparatus of mus- 
cles, to enable it to excavate its subterranean habitation. 

We are now arrived, in our progress upwards, at Cuvier's 
second Order of Mammalians, which he names Quadrumane, or 
four-handed, and which consists of apes,^ baboons,'' and mon- 
keys,^ whose hind as well as fore-foot is usually furnished w^ilh 
a thumb opposite to the fingers, so that ihey can use all their 

1 See above, p. 262, 272. 2 Ursus. 

3 Gvlo. 4 Talpa. 

5 Erinaceus. 6 Simla, &c. 

7 Cynocepkalus, &c. 8 Lemur, &c. 



302 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

feet for preliension : the object of Providence by tliis structure 
is to enable these animals to move about amongst the branches 
of the trees, which are their usual habitations, and to fix them- 
selves securely upon them, so that they can use their hands to 
gather fruit or any other purpose. Thus also they can peram- 
bulate the trees with as much ease and safety as we do our 
houses; and run up and down the branches with as much 
celerity as we do our staircases : but they cannot make equal 
progress on the earth, or a plane surface, whether they go on 
four feet or two. 

Even man himself, tbough he ordinarily cannot use his toes 
for prehension, yet is sometimes placed in such circumstances, 
as to acquire the power of doing so. I remember, when a boy, 
going to see a girl who was born w^ithout arms, and was ex- 
liibited by her parents to the public. She could use her toes 
as fingers ; could liold scissors, cut out watch-papers, sew, and 
even write. An account was given in the St James's Chron- 
icle, not long ago, of a youth similarly circumstanced, who 
being cruelly turned out by his father, but patronized by his 
sister, learned to draw with his toes. In India they are used as 
fingers, and are sometimes called foot-fingers. The Hindoo 
tailor twists his thread with them, and the cook holds his knife 
while he cuts fish, vegetables, &c., the joiner, weaver, and 
other mechanics all use them for a variety of purposes ; and I 
am told by a friend, who has often been in India, that they 
can even pick up pins with them. 

We are now arrived at man himself, who, as we see, takes his 
particular denomination from t he hand. He is the only Bimane. 

The physiology and anatomy of the Human Hand, that won- 
derful organ, have been explained and reasoned with great 
ability in a separate treatise, by the eminent comparative anat- 
omist to whom that subject was assigned; I shall not, therefore, 
here say any thing on its structure and its uses: but as it has 
not been treated of as a ???or«Z organ ; as being in intimate con- 
nexion with the heart and affections; as their principal index 
and premonstrator ; and as the mighty instrument by which a 
great part of the physical good and evil which befalls our race 
is wrought, I may be permitted to make a few observations upon 
it as far as these are concerned. 

God made the body in general a fit machine, not only to ex- 
ecute the purposes of its immaterial inhabitant the soul; but, 
in some sort, he made it a mirror to rcilcct all its hearings and 
character; to indicate every motion of the fiuctualing sea 
within, whether its surges lift themselves on high elevated by 



PREHENSORY ORGANS. 303 

the gusts of passion; or all is calm, and hanqiiil, and subdued. 
None of the bodily organs, by its sliuctuie and station in the 
body, is so evidently formed in all lespecls for these functions as 
the Hand. The eye indeed is, perhaps, tiie most faithful 
mirror of the soul's emotion; yet though it may best pourtray 
and render visible the internal feeling, it can in no degree exe- 
cute its biddings; but the hand is the great agent and nunister 
of the soul, which not only reveals her inmost affection and 
feeling, and, in conjunction with the tongue — and these two 
in connection are either the most benificent or maleficent of all 
our organs — declares her will and purpose; but is also em- 
ployed by her to execute them. Thus Heart and Hand, the 
principle and the practice, have been united, in common par- 
lance, from ancient ages. The earliest dawn of reason in the 
innocent infant is shown by the signs it makes with its little 
hands ; by them it prefers its petitions for any thing it desires, 
and, in imitation of this, God's children are instructed to lift up 
holy hands in prayer.^ Love, friendship, charit}^, and all the 
kindly affections of our nature, use the hands as their symbol 
and organ ; the fond embrace, the hearty shake, the liberal gift, 
are all ministered by them. Joy, gladness, applause, welcome, 
valediction, all use these organs to represent them. Penitence 
smites her breast wnth them; resignation clasps them; devotion 
and the love of God stretches them out towards heaven. 

But the hands are not employed to express only the kindly 
affections of the soul. Those of a contrary and less amiable 
character use them as their index. Anger threatens, and more 
violent and hateful passions destroy by them. They are indeed 
the instruments by which a great portion of the evil, and mis- 
chief, and violence, and misery, that our corrupt nature has in- 
troduced into the world, are perpetrated. 

The hand also, on some occasions, becomes the spokesman 
instead of the tongue. The fore-finger is denominated the index, 
because we use it to indicate to another any object to which 
we wish to direct his attention. By it the deaf and dumb per- 
son is enabled to hold converse with others so as not lo be to- 
tally cut off from the enjoyment of society ; and by it w^e can 
likewise mutually communicate our thoughts w^ien separated 
by space however wide, even with our Antipodes. 

The Deity himself, also, condescends to convey spiritual 
benefits to his people b}^ means of the hands of avUhorized 
persons, as in Confirmation and Ordination; and the Blessed 
Friend, and Patron, and Advocate and Deliverer of our race, 

1 I Tim. ii. 8. 



301 LOCOMOTIVE AND 

wheQ he was upon earth, appears to have wrought most of his 
miracles of heahiig by laying on his liands;^ in benediction 
also, when children were brought unto him he laid [lis hands 
on them; and at his ascension he hfted up his hands to bless 
his disciples.^ 

To enumerate all the modes by which the internal affection 
of the soul is indicated by the hand would be an endless task. 
I shall therefore only further observe, that the greater part of 
the instances I have adduced are natural, and not conventional 
or casual modes of expressing feeling, as is evident from their 
being employed, with little variation, in all ages, nations, and 
states of society. 

How grateful then ought we to be to our Creator for enrich- 
ing us with these admirable organs, which more than any 
outward one that we possess, are the immediate instruments 
that enable us to master the whole globe that we inhabit, not 
merely the visible and tangible matter that we tread upon, 
and its furniture and population, but even often to take hold 
as it were of the invisible substances that float around it, and 
to bottle up the lightning and the wind, as well as the waters. 
Thus by their means do we add daily increments to our know- 
ledge and science, and consequently power; to our skill in arts 
and every aUied manufacture and manipulation; to our com- 
forts, pleasures, and every thing desirable in life. 

If now — having arrived at the most perfect instrument, as 
to its uses, and the most important to the happiness and wel- 
fare of the Human race, whether it be considered as an instru- 
ment of ffood or evil— we turn back and review this lonsr train 
of organs for every kind of motion, and every kind of operation, 
and consider inoreover the animal to which each belongs with 
respect to its place and station, connection, powers of mul- 
tiplication, relative magnitude, form, composition, structure, 
functions, and at the same time take into further consideration 
the theatre upon which each is destined to appear, the medium 
in which it is to move and breathe, and the beings, whether 
vegetable or animal, with which it is to come in contact, and 
upon which it is to act. 

When, I say, we lake this review, what an infinite diversity 
in every respect bewilders our thought, and wc are unable to 
form any distinct idea of the general eOect and harmony that 
we know to be produced, nor how all these instruments, dove- 
tail, as it were, so as to form the whole into one great fabric or 
sphere of agents, all contributing to fulfil the purposes of the 

1 Mark, viii. 2:i—2o. 2 Marh, x. J6. Lvhe, .\xiv. f.O. 



PREHEN80RY ORGANS. 305 

Great Being who fabricated it, and promoting (he general health 
and welfare of the whole system. But this we can understand 
that the Fabricator of this sphere must have taken a simultane- 
ous survey of all the circumstances here mentioned ; must have 
calculated the momentum of each individual, have weighed 
and measured it, so that it should not exceed a certain standard ; 
must have seen at once all that it wanted to fit it for its station ; 
must, before he made it, have formed a correct estimate of all 
the requisite materials, whether gaseous, aquiform, or solid, so 
as to put together the whole harmonious compages without 
failing in a single atom; and give full accomplishment to his 
will. 

He who could effect all this could only be one whose Under- 
standing is infinite, and whose Power and Goodness are equally 
withowt bounds. 



00 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

On Instinct. 

There is no department of Zoological Science that furnishes 
stronger proofs of the being and attributes of the Deity, than 
that which relates to the Instincts of animals, and the more so, 
because where reason and intellect are most powerful and suf- 
ficient as guides, as in man, and most of the higher grades of 
animals, there usually instinct is weakest and least wonderful, 
while, as we descend in the scale, we come to tribes that ex- 
hibit, in an almost miraculous manner, the workings of a Divine 
Power, and perform operations that the intellect and skill of 
man would in vain attempt to rival or to imitate. Yet there is 
no question, concerning wiiich the Natural Historian and Phy- 
siologist seems more at a loss than when he is asked — what is 
Instinct] So much has been ably written upon the subject, 
so many hypotheses have been broached, that it seems won- 
derful so thick a cloud should still rest upon it. It must not 
be expected, where so many eminent men have more or less 
failed, that one of less powers should be enabled to throw much 
new light upon this palpable obscure, or dissipate all the dark- 
ness that envelopes the secondary or intermediate cause of In- 
stinct. Could even the bee or the ant tell us what it is that 
goads theiu to their several labours, and instructs them how to 
perform them, peihaps we might still have much to learn 
before we should have any right to cry with the Syracusaii 
Mathematician, 'Eyg««*, I have unveiled the mystery. Still, 
however unequal to the task, I cannot duly discharge the duty 
incumbent upon me, who may be said to be officially engaged 
to prove the great truths of Natural Religion from lUe Instincts 
of the animal creation, to leave the subject of Instinct, consi- 
dered in the abstract, exactly as I found it; a field, in which 
wlioever perambulates, may wander " in endless mazes lost." 
I will, therefore, do my best to make the way, in a small de- 
gree, more level, and less intricate, than it has hitherto been. 
But, before I proceed, lest the reader should feel disposed to 
accuse me of conirudicting the opinions on this subj<u't slated 
iri the Inlrodiiction to Kntomoloiry^ I l)og to direri. his al lent ion 
to the following paragiaph in the advertisement to the third 



INSTINCT. 307 

volume of tliat work. "It will not be amiss here to state, in 
order to obviate any charge of inconsistency in the possible event 
of Mr Kirby's adverting in any other work to this subject, that, 
though on every material point, the authors have agreed in 
opinion, (heir views of tiie theory of Instinct do not precisely ac- 
cord. That given in the second and fourth volumes is from the 
pen of Mr Spence." 

It is not without considerable reluctance that the author of 
this essay takes the field, in some degree, against his worthy 
friend and learned coadjutor, but as he is thus left at liberty to 
do it, and the nature of his subject requires it, he will state 
those views, which seem to himself most consistent with nature 
and truth, and most accordant with the general plan of crea- 
tion. It is doubtful whether the ancients had any distinct idea 
of that impulse upon animals, urging them necessarily to cer- 
tain actions, which modern writers have denominated instinct. 
Aristotle, indeed, in a passage of his physics quoted by Bochart,^ 
alludes to certain writers who doubted whether spiders, ants, 
and similar animals were directed in their works by intellect, 
or by any other faculty. The Stagyrite himself resolves the 
causes of motion into intellect and appetite,^ but I have not 
been able to discover that he has recorded any opinion as to 
what cause the, now called, instincts of animals, whether to 
appetite or intellect, are to be attributed: he says much on the 
subject of the hive bee, but it is merely a history of its proceed- 
ings, unaccompanied by a single syllable from which we might 
conjecture that he attributed any part of these proceedings, 
wonderful as he must have thought them, to any faculty dis- 
tinct from intellect, and what seems more extraordinary, with- 
out any expression of admiration at the expertness, and art, 
and skill, so evident in all that this little creature almost miracu- 
lously accomplishes. On another occasion, indeed, he observes, 
that " Some of the animals that have no blood, have a more 
intelligent soul than some of those that have blood, as the bee 
and the ant genus. "^ A much later Greek writer has asked 
the question, " Who taught the bee, that wise workman, to act the 
geometer, and to erect her three-storied houses of hexagonal struc- 
tures?'''^^ And this is the question I shall now endeavour to 
answer. 

1 Hierozoic. ii. 599, b. 2 De anima, 1. iii. c. 11. 

3 De Part. Animal. 1. ii. c. 4. 

4 T/c rnv fxiXirretv, tuv a-o<p»v t«v epyATiv 
Tiee/uiiTpiiv iTrna-ty ttcti <T^ia)po<pii? 
O/KJSf tyupuv i^ctyovuv Krta-fxeircev . 

Pisidius, De Mundi Opificio, quoted by Bochart. 



308 INSTINCT. 

When we consider the infinite variety of instincts, therr nice 
and striking adaptation to the circumstances, wants, and station 
of the several animals that are endowed with them, of which 
numerous instances will he given hereafter, we see such evi- 
dent marks of design, and such varied attention to so many 
particulars, such a conformity between the organs and instro- 
nients of each animal, and the work it has to do, that we can- 
not hesitate a moment to ascribe it to some power who planned 
tlie machine with a view to accomplish a certain purpose, and 
when we further consider that all the different animals combine 
to fulfil one great end, and to effect a vast purpose, all the 
details of which the human intellect cannot embrace, we are 
led further to acknowledge that the whole was planned and 
executed by a Being whose essence is unfathomable, and whose 
power is irresistible. 

I must here previously observe, that in considering this mys- 
terious subject, we must avoid, as much as possible, building 
our theories upon facts which, if properly interpreted, are ex- 
traneous to the subject, and weai* such an aspect of the mar- 
vellous, as to appear out of the regular course of nature, and 
the ordinai'y proceedings to which its instinct urges any animal. 
The cases here alluded to, if true, to the full extent of the state- 
ments concerning them, would rather indicate a particular 
interposition of Divine Providence, either to prevent some cala- 
mity, or to produce some blessing or benefit to the individuals 
concerned. Thus the account of Sir H. Lee's dog, mentioned 
by Mr French,^ which saved its master's hfe, by taking and 
maintaining its station, which it had never before done, under 
his bed; and that given by Dr Beattie, of a dog, who, when 
Ins master was in a situation of the itiost imminent peril, after 
fruitlessly attempting to save him, ran to a neighbouring village, 
and by significant gestures at last prevailed upon a man to 
follow him, and saved his master's life. These and manj^ 
more such cases, can scarcely be regarded as belonging to the 
ordinary instinct of the species, for if it did, more murderers 
would be disappointed of their intended victim by the agency 
ef his or her dog. I knew mj'self an instance, in which a most 
valuable life was saved by a dog, which, being condemned 
to the halter by a former master, and escaping from those 
appointed to dispatch him, at last established himself, after re- 
peated expulsion, in my friend's family, and afterwards, there 
is every reason to believe, by the sacrifice of his own life, pre- 
vented his master from being drowned.^ These cases aie 

1 Zool. Journ. i. 7. 2 JJhHal: def Se. Jfaturtl. xxi. 



INSTINCT. 309 

remarkable, but they do not appear to belong to instinct, but 
rather to the doctrine of a particular Providence. 

Some cases upon record, with respect to dogs and otiier ani- 
mals, belong to intellect and memory rather than instinct. 
M. Dureau de la Motte, in a memoir on the influence of domes- 
ticity in animals, mentions a dog, which beingshut out, would 
use tlie knocker of the door;* and I had myself a cat, which 
indicated its wish to come in or go out, by endeavouring with 
its fore paws to move the handle of the door-latch of the apart- 
ment; and used every morning to call me by making the same 
indication at the door of my bed-room : other cats have at- 
tempted to ring the bell. But the most remarkable instance, 
is one related, by the writer just named, of a very intelligent 
dog, which was employed to carry letters betw^een two gentle- 
men, and never failed punctually to execute his commission — 
first delivering the letter, which was fastened to his collar, and 
then going to the kitchen to be fed. After this, he went to 
the parlour window, and barked, to tell the gentleman he was 
ready to carry back the answer.^ 

The remarkable case of the ass Valiante,^ and of other ani- 
mals that find their way to their old quarters from a great dis- 
tance, may be attributed, I think, rather to natural sagacity 
and memory, than to any instinctive impulse. The animal 
just alluded to might have sagacity enough to keep near the 
sea, or a concurrence of accidental circumstances might befriend 
her. 

Divine Providence has at its disposal the whole animal crea- 
tion, and can employ all their instincts and their faculties to 
bring about its own purposes, both with respect to individuals 
and mankind in general. Man, who may be called, under 
God, the king of the visible creation, makes a similar use of 
the creatures that are placed at his disposal; of some, as the 
horse and the ox, he employs the physical powers; of others, 
as the bee and the dog, he avails himself of the instinct. Some 
he instructs how they are to do his work ; others, he takes as 
he finds them. So the Deity, it may be presumed, with a secret 
hand, guides some to fulfil his will, instructing them, as it were, 
because their unaided instinct would not alone avail, in the 
decree they are to execute, while others, merely by following 
the bent of their nature, do the same. In many cases, also, he 
may be supposed merely to direct them to the field in which he 
means they should labour, and then leave them to their instincts 

1 Annal. des Sc. Naturel. xxi. 52. 2 Annal. des Sc. Naturel. 66. 

3 Jn:trod. to Ent. ii. 496. Note a. 



310 INSTINCT. 

to accomplish his purposes. In the case of the dog who saved 
his master from intended assassination, a supernatural impulse 
might carry him to his chamber and cause him to maintain his 
station there, and when the hour of danger arrived, his natural 
instinct would suffice for the defence and liberation of his master 
from the threatened danger. 

When we consider the work that animals have to do in this 
globe of ours, each in a particular department, and to a certain 
extent, it seems absolutely necessary that, on many occasions, 
the interference of a Supreme Power should take place, to say 
to each, " Hitherto shalt thou come and no further" and only an 
Omnipresent Being, infinite in power, wisdom, and goodness, 
could check the further progress of any body of his workmen 
when he foresaw it would be noxious, exceed his intentions, 
and derange his plans. 

" Jfec Deus inter sit ^ nisi dignus vindice nodus 
Incident," 

was the dictum of a poet, who had as much judgment, and 
good sense, as he had genius ; and it is only where ordinary 
means are evidently insufficient to account for any fact, that 
we are at liberty to ascribe it to the extraordinary interposition 
of the Deity ; or to any intermediate supernatural agency em- 
ployed by him to produce it: and no class of facts so loudly 
proclaim their Great Author as those which are the result of 
the nice balancing of conflicting energies and operations ob- 
servable in the different departments of the animal kingdom. 

We may observe, however, that when our Saviour says to 
his disciples concerning sparrows — One of them shall not fall to 
the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head 
are all numbered ;^ the observation implies that nothing escapes 
the notice, or is too mean, or insignificant, to be below the at- 
tention and care of Him who is all eye, all ear, all intellect ; 
who directeth all things to answer his purposes, according to 
the good pleasure of his icill,^ which is the universal good of his 
creatures. 

Having premised these general observations, I shall now 
proceed to inquire into the proximate cause of instinct; admit- 
ting, as proved, that every kind of instinct has its origin in the 
will of the Deity, and that the animal exhibiting it, was ex- 
pressly organized by Him for it at its creation. 



1 Matth. X. 29, 30. 2 Kpfn 



INSTINCT. 311 

The proximate Cciuse of iiistincL must be either metaphysical 
Of physical, or a compouMcl of botli ciiaracters. 

1. If metaphysical, it must eitlier be tlie immediate action of 
the Deity, or tlie action of some intermediate intelhgence em- 
ployed by him, or tiie intellect of the animal exhibiting it. 

2. U physical, it must be ihe action or stimulus of some 
physical power or agent employed by the Deity, and under liis 
guidance, so as to work His will upon the organization of the 
animal, which must be so constructed as to respond to that 
action in a certain way ; or by the exhibition of certain phe- 
nomena peculiar to the individual genus or species. 

3. If compound or mixed, it will be subject occasionally to vari- 
ations from the general law, when the intelligent agent sees fit. 

1. With respect to ihe first Hypothesis, one of the principal 
promulgators and patrons of which is Addison,^ it nearly 
amounts to this, as that amiable writer confesses, that " God 
is the soul of brutes." It is contrary, however, to the general 
plan of Divine Providence, which usually produces effects in- 
directly, and by the intervention and action of means or 
secondary causes, to suppose that it acts immediately upon 
insects and other animals, and is so intimately connected with 
them as to direct their instinctive operations ; such an action, 
it should seem, would be infaUible, and never at fault, whereas 
observation has proved that animals are sometimes mistaken, 
where their instinct should direct them. For, if God were 
their immediate instructor, would it be possible for the flesh-fly, 
as I have seen that she does, to mistake the blossom of the 
carrion-plant,^ for a piece of flesh, and lay her eggs in it ; or for 
a hen to sit upon a piece of chalk, as they are stated to do,^ 
instead of an eggi Still all instincts are from God, He decreed 
them, and organized animals to act according to that decree, 
and employed means to impel them to do so. 

Other arguments might be adduced proving that this Hy- 
pothesis does not rest upon a sound foundation; but as I shall 
hereafter advert to some of these, I shall now proceed to con- 
sider whether instinct be the action of some intermediate intelli- 
gence, employed by the Deity, upon the animal exhibiting it. 

An ingenious and acute writer, Mr French, is the author of 
this Hypothesis, which appeared in the first number of the 
Zoological Journal. He infers, " That the Divine Energy 
does in reality act, not immediately, but mediately, or througli 

1 See Spectator, ii. p. 121. 2 Stapelia hirsuta. 

3 Spectator, ii. n 120. 



312 INSTINCT. 

the medium of moral and intellectual influences, upon the na- 
ture or consciousness of the creature, in the production of the 
various, and in many instances, truly wonderful actions which 
they perform; that brutes are governed by such agencies, good 
and evilj but under the control of Providence; and that such 
agencies act by impressions upon their conscious nature, but 
unperceived by it in a moral or intellectual sense."^ He thgs 
opens the way to his theory. " If it be asked by what inter- 
mediate agency the operations of brutes are thus directed; — I 
reply that it is generally admitted by a large class of mankind, 
at least, that superior (yet intermediate) powers of some kind, 
are in actual connection with the human mind."^ 

From the passages here quoted, it seems evident (though the 
author declares that he will not even " venture a suggestion* 
as to the nature of the superior powers here alluded to,")^ that 
he bad in his mind those good and evil intelligences that are 
generally acknowledged to be in actual connection with the 
human mind; or, to use the common phraseology. Angels and 
Demons. The former being the cause of the beneficent^ and 
the latter of the ferocious instincts of animals. 

When he further observes — "Upon these principles the mixed 
natures of some animals are satisfactorily explained; — as in 
the instance of the Phoca ursina, the males of which species 
manifest the most singular tenderness towards their young 
progeny ; and, at the same time, a savage and persecuting dis- 
position towards their females."* 

From this passage it would seem that the author was of 
opinion that the same animal was subject to the agency both 
of good and evil intermediate intelligences, the one producing 
its affection, and the other its ferocity. 

When our Saviour denominates serpents and scorpions the 
power of the enemy^^ it may perhaps be thought that he affords 
some countenance to this opinion, especially as the evil spirit 
actually made use of the serpent, as his organ and instrument, 
when he accomplished the fatal lapse of our first parents from 
the original rectitude of their nature. But, if we pay due at- 
tention to the context, we shall find that, in this passage, as 
often in other parts of Scripture, the symbol is put for the thing 
symbolized. " / beheld Satan, as lightning, fall from Heaven,^^ 
says our Lord. " Behold, I give unto you power to tread on ser- 
pents and scorpions, and upon all the power of the enemy. — JVercr- 
theless in this rejoice not that the spirits are subject to you.^^^ The 

1 Zool. Jourti. i. 5, (> 2 Hid. 3 Ibid. f>. 

4 Ihid. 7. 5 Luke, x. 19. 6 Ibid. 18—20. 



INSTINCT. 313 

treading therefore on serpents and scorpions was treading upon 
the spirits of which they were figures. 

If we duly reflect upon the incongruity of an angel and a 
demon influencing the same animal, in so far as it exhibits in- 
stincts partly benevolent and partly ferocious, we shall be con- 
vinced that this hypothesis, pursued to all its consequences, 
cannot stand. Intermediate agents between the Deity and 
the brute are as much in the place of a soul to the latter, as 
the Supreme Intelligence would be if his action upon them 
were immediate, so that the same irrational animal would be 
alternately a machine impelled by a good or evil intelligence. 
According to this hypothesis, the bee, that symbol of wisdom, 
when she sets out upon her beneficent errand of collecting 
honey and pollen, is acted upon by the good angel ; but, if she 
meets with any thing that excites her fear or her anger, she is 
stimulated to take vengeance upon the object of her displea- 
sure, and to make him feel the puncture of her poisoned dart, 
by the evil one. 

This can never be admitted. The same objection too lies 
against this hypothesis as against the last, that it does not ac- 
count for the mistakes sometimes made by the animal when 
endeavouring to accomplish its instinct. It cannot be supposed 
that, in the case before mentioned, the intelligent intermediate 
agent would stimulate the flesh-fly to deposit her eggs upon 
the blossoms of the carrion-plant, where the young must in- 
evitably perish from hunger, instead of upon real flesh. 

I am next to consider whether instinct be the result of the 
intellectual powers of the animal itself that exhibits it. If we 
survey the diflferent tribes of the animal kingdom, we shall find 
a vast difference between them with respect to intellect. That 
wonderful pulp, which of all substances is alone able to respond 
to incorporeal agency: to receive and store up the information 
collected by the organs of sensation, that it may be ready for 
future use, and which is the seat of the intellectual faculties, 
that wonderful pulp appears under very different circumstances 
in the different Classes of animals; but it has not been made 
evident that the acutenessof the intellect, though in some in- 
stances it seems to do so,* depends altogether upon the com- 
parative volume of the brain ; for that of the mouse, compared 
with its size, is greater than that of the half-reasoning ele- 



1 The brain of the elephant is five times the size of that of the rhinoceros, 
being as 182 to 35. The space for the brain is smaller in the parrot than in 
any other bird. Lit. Gaz. May 28, 1831. Philos, Trans. 1822. 42. 
PP 



314 INSTINCT. 

phant.i Man indeed, generally speaking, has the largest brain 
of all animals, but it seems a singular anomaly that persons of 
very weak intellects have often disproportionately large heads, 
indicating a great volume of brain. When we leave the ver- 
tebrated animals, we find the nervous system, in most, mate- 
rially altered and degraded, so that more power is given appa- 
rently to instinct and less to intellect. In other animals, as we 
descend, the nervous system becomes more and more dispersed, 
so that in those at the foot of the scale we discern no traces of 
intellect, and very few of instinct ; and only so much apparent 
sensation as is necessary for the purposes of nutrition and repro- 
duction. I have made the above observations because they bear 
in some degree on the question now before us. For if we pay 
due attention to the proceedings of animals, we shall find that 
those whose nervous system is cerebral usually exhibit the 
most striking proofs of intellectual action, are most capable of 
instruction, and are less remarkable for the complexity and in- 
tenseness of their instincts ; while those of the next grade, 
whose nervous system is ganglionic, as far as we know them, 
though not devoid of intellect, are endued with a much smaller 
portion of it, while their instinctive operations are all but mira- 
culous, and that where the nervous system is still less concen- 
trated both are greatly weakened, till at the bottom of the scale 
they almost disappear. From hence it seems to follow that 
extraordinary instinctive powers are not the result of extraor- 
dinary intellectual ones. 

But when we reflect further, that even in cases where the 
instincts are most complex and wonderful, the animal practises 
them infallibly, without guide or direction, and is as expert at 
at them when it first emerges into hfe, as when it has been 
long engaged in the practice of them ; it follows that it must 
be instructed in them from the first moment of its existence in 
the state in which it exercises them, by an infallible teacher. 
The bee, the moment it emerges from the pupa, begins to col- 
lect honey and pollen, and to perform all the other manipula- 
tions that belong to her instincts. 

In the higher animals the case is somewhat different. When 
they emerge into life, from the womb, or from the egg, it is 
usually in a state of helplessness, in which at first they can do 
little or nothing for themselves but suck, or receive food from, 
their dam. As their organization developes they gradually 
gain new powers, till they arrive at their acme, or age of pu- 
berty. 

1 Cuv. j}nat. Couip. li. 148. 



INSTINCT. 315 

The young beaver generally remains with its parents till it 
is three years old, when they couple, and build a cabin for 
themselves and offspring. The unfledged bird remains quietly 
in its nest, and is content to receive its food and warmth from 
its parents, but no sooner are its feathers grown, and its beaked 
prow and plumy oars and rudder fit it to win its way, in the 
ocean of air, than, incited by paiental exhortations, it makes 
the attempt, and henceforth is equal to support itself, and to 
fulfil the biddings of instinct as well as of intellect and appetite. 
This storge stimulates the parent animal while its care of its 
young is necessary to them and then ceases. This is there- 
fore chiefly instinctive ; but in the most intellectual of all 
animals, where instinctive love ceases, rational love begins ; 
and care and anxiety for the welfare of our offspring, and 
affectionate regard for their persons, continues after they cease 
to have any need of our help and attention. 

It is not always easy in this tribe of animals to distinguish 
those actions that are purely instinctive from those that are not 
so, and winters on this subject, as was before observed, often 
ascribe to instinct actions that are produced by other causes. 
Animals of the higher grades, by means of their organs of sen- 
sation, acquire ideas upon which they in some sort reason, by 
comparing one with another ; thus they get experience, and 
as they grow older literally grow wiser. Hence we see old ones 
often very cunning and expert in removing obstacles, finding 
their way, and the like. 

With regard to truly instinctive actions, they invariably 
follow the development of the organization ; are neither the 
result of instruction, nor of observation and experience, but the 
action of some external agency upon the organization, w^hich 
is fitted by the Omniscient Creator to respond to its action. 

Indeed, if intellect was the sole fountain of those operations 
usually denominated instinctive, animals, though they sought 
the same end, w^ould vary more or less in the path they seve- 
rally took to arrive at it; they would require some instruction 
and practice before they could be perfect in their operations ; 
the new born bee would not immediately be able to rear a cell, 
nor know where to go for the materials, till some one of riper 
experience had directed her. But experience and observation 
have nothing to do with her proceedings. She feels an indom- 
itable appetite which compels her to take her flight from the 
hive when the state of the atmosphere is favourable to her pur- 
pose. Her organs of sight — which though not gifted with any 
power of motion, are so situated as to enable her to see what- 
ever passes above, below, and on each side of her — enable her 



316 INSTINCT. 

to avoid any obstacles, and to thread her devious way through 
the numerous and intertwining brandies of shrubs and flow- 
ers ; some other sense directs iier to those which contain the 
precious articles she is in quest of. But though her senses 
guide her in her flight, and indicate to her where she may 
most profitably exercise her talent, they must then yield her to 
the impulse and direction of her instincts, which this happy 
and industrious little creature plies with indefatigable diligence 
and energy, till having completed her lading of nectar and am- 
brosia, she returns to the common habitation of her people, 
with whom she unites in labours before described,^ for the gen- 
eral benefit of the community to which she belongs. 

More reasons might be adduced to prove that intellect is not 
the great principle of instinct, but enough seems to have been 
said to establish that point. It should be borne in mind, how- 
ever, that though intellect is not the great principle, yet it 
must be admitted that all animals gifted with the ordinary or- 
gans of sensation, more or less employ their intellect in the 
whole routine of their instinctive operations, as I shall show 
under another head. 

2. But if no metaphysical power can be satisfactorily demon- 
strated to be the intermediate cause of instinct, then it seems 
to follow that it must be either a physical one, or one partly 
physical and partly metaphysical. 

In the former case, it must be the action of some phj^sical 
power or agent, employed by the Deity, and under his guid- 
ance so as to work his will, upon the organization of the ani- 
mal ; which must be so constructed as to respond to that action 
in a certain way, or by the exhibition of certain phenomena 
peculiar to the individual genus or species. 

Mr Addison has observed — " There is not, in my opinion, 
any thing more mysterious in nature than this instinct in ani- 
mals, which thus rises above reason, and falls infinitely short 
of it. It cannot be accounted for by any properties in matter, 
and at the same time works after so odd a manner, that one 
cannot think it the faculty of an intelligent being. For my 
own part, I look upon it as upon the principle of Gravitation in 
bodies, which is not to be explained by any known qualities 
inherent in the bodies themselves, nor from any laws of n)e- 
chanism, but according to the best notions of the greatest phi- 
losophers, is an innncdiate impression from the First Mover, 
and the Divine Energy acting in the creatures.''^ 

1 See above, p. 288, jjiid hifrnd. to Evt. ii. 17:t. 
a SppctJitor. ii. n. I 'JO. 



INSTINCT. 317 

I have quoted this passage not as if Addison intended to 
patronize the hopothesis now befoVe me, but to refer to his 
illustration of instinct by comparing it with Gravity. If Gra- 
vity be the result of physical agency, and not an immediate 
impression of the First Mover, so may Instinct be hkewise. 
Reasoning from analogy it seems inconsistent with the custom- 
ary method of the Divine proceedings with regard to man, and 
this visible system of which he is the most important part — 
for a being that combines in himself matter and spirit, must be 
more important than a whole world that does not combine 
spirit with matter — to act immediately upon any thing but spi- 
rit, except by the intermediate agency of some physical though 
subtile substance, empowered by him to act as his vicegerent 
in nature, and to execute the law that has received his sanc- 
tion. 

If we consider the effects produced by the great physical 
powers of the heavens, by whatever name we distinguish them : 
that they form the instrument by w^hich God maintains the 
whole universe in order and beauty ; produces the cohesion of 
bodies ; regulates and supports the motions, annual and diur- 
nal, of the earth and other planets ; prescribes to some an 
eccentric orbit, extending, probably, into other systems ;^ causes 
satellites to attend upon and revolve round their primary pla- 
nets ; and not only this, but by a kind of conservating energy 
empowers them to prevent any dislocations in the vast ma- 
chine ; and any destructive aberrations arising from the ac- 
tion of these mighty orbs upon each other. If we consider 
further what God eflfects both upon and within every indivi- 
dual sphere and system, throughout the whole universe, by 
the constant action of those viceregal powers, if I may so call 
them, that rule under him, whatever name we give them ; I 
say, if we duly consider what these powers actually effect, it 
will require no great stretch of faith to laelieve that they may be 
the inter-agents by which the Deity acts upon animal organi- 
zations and structures to produce all their varied instincts. 

An eminent French zoologist^ has illustrated the change of 
instincts, resulting from the modification of the nervous sys- 
tem, which takes place in a butterfly, in the transit to its per- 
fect or imago state from the caterpillar, by a novel and striking 
simile. He compares the animal to a portable or hand organ, 
in which, on a cylinder that can be made to revolve, several 
tunes are noted ; turn the cylinder and the tune for which it is 
set is played ; draw it out a notch and it gives a second ; 

1 La 'Place. E. T. ii. 337. 341. 2 Dr Virey. 



318 INSTINCT, 

and so you may go on till the whole number of tunes noted 
on it have had their turn. This, happily enough, repre- 
sents the change which appears to take place in the verte- 
bral chord and its ganglions on the metamorphosis of the 
caterpillar into the butterfly, and the sequence of new instincts 
which result from the change. But if we extend the compa- 
rison, we may illustrate by it the two spheres of organized be- 
ings that we find on our globe, and their several instinctive 
changes and operations. We may suppose each kingdom of 
nature to be represented by a separate cylinder, having noted 
upon it as many tunes as there are species differing in their 
respective instincts — for plants may be regarded, in some sense, 
as having their instincts as well as animals — and that the 
constant impulse of an invisible agent causes each cylinder to 
play in a certain order all the tunes noted upon it: this will 
represent, not unaptly, what takes place, with regard to the 
devolopment of instincts, in the vegetable and animal king- 
doms ; and our simile will terminate in the inquiry, whose 
may be that invisible hand that thus shakes the sistrum of 
Isis,* and produces that universal harmony of action, resulting 
from that due intermixture of concords and discords, according 
to the will of its Almighty Author, in that infinitely diversified 
and ever moving sphere of beings which we call nature.'^ 

What, if the powers lately mentioned, and which, in the 
Introduction to the present work, I hope I have made it appear, 
are synonymous with the physical Cherubim of the Holy Scrip- 
tures, or the heavens in action which under God govern the 
universe; what, if these powers — employed as they are by the 
Deity so universally to effect his Almighty will in the uphold- 
ing of the worlds in their stated motions, and preventing their 
aberrations, — should also be the intermediate agents, which by 
their action on plants and animals produce every physical 
development and instinctive operation, unless where God him- 
self decrees a departure that circumstances may render neces- 
sary from any law that he has established] 

With regard to the vegetable kingdom, consisting of organ- 
ized beings without sense or voluntary motion, few would deny 
that they are subject to the dominion of the elements, and re- 
spond to the action of those mysterious powers that rule, under 
God, in nature. But when the query is concerning the animal 
kingdom, most of the members of which to organization and 
life add a will and powers of voluntary motion, and many have 
a degree of intelligence residing within them which governs 

I The Sislriim of" Isis symbolized the elements. '<J <jfv<nc TuvaLioxt,. 



INSTINCT. 319 

many of their actions, we hesitate as to the answer we shall 
return to it. 

It will furnish a presumptive proof that those actions which 
are instinctive in animals are the results of the action of those 
intermediate powers to which I have just alluded, if it can be 
shown, that there is any thing in plants at all analogous to the 
instincts of animals, for if there be, one can scarcely suppose 
that they are produced by a different cause. Let us, therefore, 
now leaving the animal kingdom, — which to us perhaps appears 
the sole theatre in w^hich instincts manifest themselves — and 
turning our attention to the vegetable, inquire whether any 
thing analogous to these springs of action is discoverable there. 

One remarkable distinction, between the animal and the 
vegetable is in the difference of the principles that form their 
pabulum. The former does not become the nutriment of the 
latter till it is chemically decomposed ; whereas the latter 
becomes the food of the former, either in its green, or ripe state, 
and is not decomposed and turned to nutriment till it is passed 
into its stomach, and is subject to various actions of various 
organs, or their products, so that, though the food of both is de- 
composed in order to be assimilated, yet with regard to the vege- 
table this happens before it enters it, but to the animal after it 
enters it, the decomposing powers being without the plant and 
within the animal. In the former case it is the action of the 
atmosphere unassisted by the organization of the plant — in the 
latter it is the same action assisted by the organization of the 
animal. 

Another thing may be here observed — that as the most re- 
markable instincts of animals are those connected with the 
propagation of the species, so the analogue of these instincts in 
plants is the development of these parts peculiarly connected 
with the production of the seed— so that the expanded flower 
and the operations going on in it is the analogue of the repro- 
ductive instinct of the animal : this is all produced by physical 
action upon the organization of the plant. Now if we consider 
the infinite variety of plants, and the wonderful diversity of 
their parts of fructification, and that these are all produced in 
their several seasons and stations by the action of some physical 
powers upon their varied organization, and by means of the 
soil in which they are planted, we shall think it nearly as 
wonderful and accountable as the instinctive operations of the 
various creatures that feed upon them. That the same action 
should unfold such an infinite variety of forms in one case and 
instincts in the other is equally astounding and equally difficult 
to explain. — Compare the sunflower and the hive-bee, the 



320 INSTINCT. 

compound flowers of the one, and the aggregate of combs of 
the other — the receptacle with its seeds, and the combs with 
the grubs. 

Again, as all plants have their appropriate fructification, so 
they have other peculiarities connected with their situation, 
nutriment, and mode of life, corresponding in some measure 
with these instincts that belong to other parts of an animal's 
economy. Some with a climbing or voluble stem, constantly 
turn one way, and some as constantly turn another. Thus 
the hop twines from the left to the right, while the bindweed 
goes from right to left;^ others close their leaves in the night, 
and seem to go to sleep ; others show a remarkable degree of 
irritability when touched ; the blossoms of many, as the sun- 
flower, follow the sun from his rising to his setting ; some blos- 
soms shut up, as in the anemone, till the sun shines upon them; 
others close at a certain hour of the day, as the goatsbeard ;^ 
another, Hedysarum gyrans, slowly revolves. The same phy- 
sical action upon a pecuhar organization produces all these 
effects. 

We may further observe that the great majority of plants 
send fortli radicles which presenting their points to the sources 
of vegetable life and nutrition on all sides, absorb each its por- 
tion, and convey it to the stem from which they issue; analogous, 
in this respect, to the polypes, which unfold and expand their 
tentacles for a similar purpose. Ivy planted against a wall or 
trunk of a tree supports itself by innumerable radicles, but I 
once saw a plant reared as a standard which sent forth none. 
This seems analogous to some animal instincts, which, depend- 
ing upon circumstances, may be called conditional ; as when, 
in the case of a sterile queen, the bees do not, as usual, mas- 
sacre the drones.^ 

There is another parallelism between the plant and the ani- 
mal, especially the insect, which appears to prove that their 
instincts are ruled by the same physical agent, I mean their 
hybernation. In extratropical countries, or a great proportion 
of them, as the year declines, and the amount of heat, received 
from its great fountain, is diminished by the shortening of the 
days, the deciduous trees and shrubs cast their leaves, plants of 
every description cease more or less their growth, and all vege- 
table nature seems to become torpid. At the same period, and 
under the influence of the same cause, the decrease of the 
amount of caloric, several of the higher animals, all the reptiles, 

1 See Willd. Princip. of Botany, § 18. n. 5]. a. h. Plato ii/. :«, 25. 

2 Tragopogon. 3 Introd. to Ent. ii. Lett. x.\. 



INSTINCT. 321 

as well as nearly the whole woild of insects, retire from the 
exercise of their wonted instincts, and conceal themselves, some 
under the earth, and others under bark, under stones, in crev- 
ices, moss, and similar hiding* places, where they take their 
winter's „sleep, till a more genial temperature whispers to them 
— Awake — and they return to their several employments. This 
effect in both the plant and the animal, seems to spring from 
the s3.me physical cause — the periodical lowering of the tempe- 
rature; so that heat appears to be ihe plectrum, and the organi- 
zation of the animal, the strings it touches, which cause it to 
exhibit the prescribed sequence of its instincts. Whoever has 
been in the habit of attending to the motions of insects will find 
them most alert in sultry weather, especially in an electric 
state of the atmosphere before a thunder storm. Heat and 
electricity also accelerate the growth of plants, if duly supplied 
with moisture. 

It is remarkable, and worthy of particular observation, veri- 
fying the old adage that extremes meet, that an approach 
towards the maximum of heat produces sometimes the same 
effects upon organized nature that an approach towards the 
minimum does. In tropical countries they do not divide the year 
into winter and summer, but into the rainy and dry seasons ; 
as to temperature, the former would, perhaps, be judged to 
correspond with our winter, and the latter with our summer, 
but with respect to the state of animals and vegetables, the 
reverse would appear to be most consistent with facts. The 
great rains, according to M. Lacordaire,* " begin to fall in 
Brazil about the middle of September, when all nature seems 
to awake from its periodical repose; vegetation resumes a more 
lively tint, and the greater part of plants renew their leaves; 
the insects begin to reappear : in October the rains are rather 
more frequent, and with them the insects ; but it is not till to- 
wards the middle of November, when the rainy season is defini- 
tively set in, that all the families appear suddenly to develope 
themselves; and this general impulse that all nature seems 
to receive continues augmenting till the middle of January, 
when it attains its acme. The forests present then an aspect 
of movement and life of which our woods in Europe can give 
no idea. During part of the day we hear a vast and uninter- 
rupted hum, in which the deafening cry of the tree-hopper^ 
prevails; and you cannot take a step, or touch a leaf, without 
putting insects to flight. At 11 A. M. the heat is become 

1 Annal. des Sc. JVatur. xx. Juin. 1830. 193. 

2 Tettigonia. Cicada, &c. 



322 INSTINCT. 

insupportable, and all animated nature becomes torpid — the 
noise diminishes — the insects, and other aninials disappear — 
and are seen no more till the evening. Tiien, when the at- 
mosphere is again cool, to the matin species succeed others 
whose office it is to embellish the nights of the torrid zone. I 
am speaking of the glow-worms^ and fire-flies ;^ whilst the 
former, issuing by myriads from their retreats, overspread the 
plants and shrubs ; the latter crossing each other in all direc- 
tions, weave in the air, as it were^ a luminous web, the light 
of which they diminish or augment at pleasure. This brilliant 
illumination only ceases when the night gives place to the day. 

As during our winters, some part of the insect population 
occasionally appear and dance in the sunbeam, so in Brazil, 
according to M. Lacordaire, during the months of May, June, 
July, and August, the season of great drought, when all nature 
is embrowned, and consequently affording no proper food for 
perfect insects; the caterpillars of Lepidoptera are those mostly 
to be met with, while in the rainy season those only that live 
in society occur. 

The great object of the Creator appears to be the employ- 
ment of the various tribes of animals, to do the work for which 
lie created them at its proper season; and where the object is 
particularly to keep within due limits the growth of plants, or 
to remove dead or putrescent substances before they generate 
miasmata, we may conjecture, that when their services are not 
wanted, they ^vould be allowed a season of repose, so that dur- 
ing winter with us, when there is little or no vegetation of the 
plant, and a hot sun does not cause putrescent substances to 
exhale unwholesome effluvia, the great body of labourers in these 
departments, we may say, are sent to bed for a time, till their 
labours are again necessary. So also in tropical countries, 
where drought and heat united are sufficient to do the work of 
nature's pruners and scavengers, by stopping vegetation, and 
immediately drying up animal and other substances, before 
putridity takes place, they then abstract themselves, and retreat 
to their winter quarters; but when the rainy season revives the 
face of nature, they return, each to exercise his appointed func- 
tion, at the bidding of his Creator. 

All these circumstances indicate an analogy between certain 
phenomena observable in the history of planls, and some of the 
instincts of animals : and tend to prove that the proximate cause 
of both may be very nearly related ; and that as the iinmediale 
cause of the vegetable instinct is c\ciu\y physical, so may be 

1 Lampijris. Pygolanqns. K. '2 Jllalcr noctiliints, S^c 



INSTINCT. 

that of the animal. With regard lo all actions, in the latter, 
which are the result of intellect, they, of course, are produced 
by some principle residing within, as when the senses guide it, 
or it exercises its memory; and these aid it in following the 
impulse of instinct. The greatest of modern chemists has ob- 
served, with respect to some such agent, "that the immediate 
connection between the sentient principle and the body may be 
established by kinds of etherial matter, which can never be 
evident to the senses, and which may bear the same relation to 
heat, light, and electricity, that these refined forms or modes of 
existence bear to the gases."^ 1 may observe upon tliis passage, 
that the farther any matter is removed from our knowledge 
and coercion, the more powerful it really is. Thus liquids are 
more powerful than solids, gases than liquids, imponderable 
fluids than gases, and so we may keep ascending till we ap- 
proach the confines of spirit, which will lead us to the foot of 
the throne of the Deity himself, the Spirit of spirits, the only 
Almighty, the only All-wise, and the only All-good. 

Dr Henry More, a very eminent philosopher and divine of 
the seventeenth centur}^^, under the name of the Spirit ofj^a- 
ture, speaks of a power between matter and spirit, which he 
describes as — " A substance incorporeal, but without sense and 
animadversion, pervading the whole matter of the universe, 
and exercising a plastical power therein, according to the sundry 
predispositions and occasions in the parts it works upon, raising 
suclV phenomena in the world, hy directing the parts of matter 
and their motion, as cannot be resolved into mere mechanical 
powers — which goes through and assists all corporeal beings, 
and is the vicarious power of God upon the universal matter of 
the world. This suggests to the spider the fancy of spinning 
and weaving her web ; and to the hee of the framing of her 
honey-comb; and especially to the silk-worm oi conglomerating 
her both funeral and natal clue ; and to the birds of building 
their nests, and of their so diligent hatching their eggs."^ 

This Spirit of Nature of Dr More seems not very diflferent 
from the Etherial Matter of Sir H. Davy ; and it is singular, 
that Dr Paris, in his interesting life of our great chemist — 
speaking of a monument to be erected to his memory at Pen- 
zance — should thus express himself. " It was to be erected 
on one of those elevated spots of silence and solitude where he 
delighted, in his boyish days, to commune with the elements, 

1 Consolations in Travel, 214. 

2 On the Immortality of the Soul, B. iii. c. 12, 13. 



324 INSTINCT. 

and wliere the Spirit of JSTature moulded his genius in one of 
her wildest moods."^ 

But — to return from this digression to Sir H. Davy's etherial 
matter bearing the same relation to heat, light, and electricity, 
that they do to the gases — I would ask, if such may be the 
powers by which the soul moves the body, and produces those 
actions that are in our own power to do or not to do, depend- 
ing upon the will, does it seem incongruous that light, heat, 
and air, or any modification of them, upon which every animal 
depends for life and breath, and nutrition and growth, and all 
things, should be employed by the Deity to excite and direct 
them, where their intellect cannot, in their instinctive opera- 
tions? That their organization, as to their instruments of man- 
ducation, motion, manipulation, &c. has a reference to their 
instincts every one owns; can we not, therefore, conceive that 
the organization of the brain and nervous system may be so 
varied and formed by the Creator, as to respond, in the way 
that he wills, to pulses upon them from the physical powers of 
nature; so as to excite animals to certain operations for which 
they were evidently constructed, in a way analogous to the 
excitement of appetite ? The new-born babe has no other 
teacher to tell it that its mother's breast will supply it with its 
proper nutriment; it cries for it; it spontaneously applies its 
mouth to it; and presses it under the bidding of appetite result- 
ing from its organization. When it arrives at the age of denti- 
tion, it as naturally uses its teeth for mastication ; it wants no 
instructor to inform it how they are to be employed to effect 
that purpose ; and so with respect to other appetites which the 
further development of its organs produces. 

It may, perhaps, be urged, in the case lately alluded to, of 
the infant growing up to puberty, that the instinctive operations 
that take place under the bidding of appetite fall under the 
general law of instinct; but it must be admitted that the gra- 
dual development of the organization is the consequence of 
the action of physical powers in the processes going on in the 
body. Or, as a learned writer on the subject asks, — ''In effect 
is instinct any thing else, but the manifestation wiihout of that 
same wisdom which directs, in the interior of our body, all our 
vital functions."^ 

Having rendered it probable that those instincts, which re- 
sult evidently from what are called bodily appetites, are the 
consequences merely of physical action upon an organization 

1 Life of Sir H. Davy, 4to. edit. 517. 
2^Dr Virey, JV. D. D'Hist. JVat. xvi. 203. 



INSTINCT. 325 

adapted to respond to it, I shall next inquire whether this may 
not be the case in instances which are not to be regarded in 
that light. 

We may divide instincts into three general heads : — 

a. Those relating to the multiplication of the species, espe- 
cially the care of animals for their young both before and after 
birth. 

fS. Those relating to their food. 

y. Those relating to their Hybernation. 

a. The pairing of animals usually begins to take place in 
the spring, when the winter is passed, the earth is covered with 
verdure and adorned by the various flowers that now expand 
their blossoms, in proportion as the great centre of light and 
heat more and more manifests his power over the earth ; the 
birds sing their love-songs ; the nightingale is now — " Most 
musical, most melancholy ;" — the cuckoo repeats his mono- 
tonous note ; and every other animal seems to partake of the 
universal joy. All this appears the result of a physical rather 
than a metaphysical excitement. 

As to their care of their future progeny, a great variety of 
circumstances take place. Viviparous animals have generally 
to give suck to their young for a time ; oviparous ones either 
to construct a nest to receive their eggs, and, after hatching, to 
provide them with appropriate food during a certain period, or 
to deposit their eggs where their young progeny, as soon as 
hatched, may infallibly find it. But first, 1 must say some- 
thing of that Storge, or instinctive affection, which is almost 
universally exhibited by females for their progeny both before 
and after parturition ; a feeling of affection not generally com- 
mon to the males, or rather only in a few instances, as where 
the male bird assists the female in incubation. Yet this in- 
stinctive fondness, as soon as it ceases to be necessary, vanishes; 
except, as was before observed,^ in the human species ; a fact 
that seems to prove that it is not the result of the association 
of ideas, but of an impress of the Creator interwoven with the 
frame. But that this impress is by means of a physical inter- 
agent, seems to follow from this circumstance — that the hen 
shows the same instinctive attachment to the young ducklings 
that have been hatched under her, that she would do to chick- 
ens, the produce of her own eggs ; and if the new-born offspring 
of any mammiferous animal is abstracted from her, and another 
substituted, even of a different kind, the same affectionate ien- 

1 See above, p. 315. 



326 INSTINCT. 

derness is manifested towards it, as its own real offspring would 
have experienced. Now was it a metaphysical, and not a 
physical, impulse, surely this would not be the case. This is 
only one of many instances, which prove that instinct is not 
infallible : and, in truth, with regard to the higher animals, 
many associations may take place between the child and parent 
that help to endear the former to the latter. In the first place, 
the very circumstance of its being the fruit of her own bowels, 
and fed with milk from her own breast must bind it to her by 
the tenderest of ties; especially as, at the same time, it relieves 
her from what is troublesome. There is something also in infant 
helplessness, and infant gambols, calculated to win upon the 
doting mother. The subsequent alienation and estrangement 
of the female from her young, which takes place in all animals 
except man, appears, in the first instance, to be produced by their 
becoming troublesome and annoying to her ; which, in some 
degree, may account for her desire to cast them off. Examin- 
ing the subject, therefore, on all sides, in the highest grades 
of animals, and those in whom maternal affection appears 
most intense, intellect and associations may be a good deal 
mixed with instinct in producing it. As we descend in the 
scale, the intensity of the feeling seems much reduced ; and, 
in numerous tribes, is confined solely to the circumstances of 
parturition. So that the Storge, and its cessation, do not ap- 
pear altogether so extraordinary and unaccountable as a cursory 
view might tend to persuade us. 

The Mammalians, in general, appear to have recourse to 
very few striking preparatory actions previously to bringing 
forth their young, since they have usually no nest to prepare 
for their reception. Cats, however, it may be observed, search 
about very inquisitively for a snug and concealed station; and 
burrowing animals naturally retire to the bottom of their bur- 
rows, when their feelings tell them their hour is come, and 
there are relieved of their precious burthen. Several others of 
the Rodentia, or gnawers, as the dormouse, make beds of their 
own hair to receive their young. In most cases that fall under 
our daily observation, the young are dropped where the moiluM- 
happens to be when the pains of labour overtake her. The 
animals we are speaking of have at hand immediately a plen- 
tiful su[)ply of food for the nutriment of their new-born offspring; 
they have not, like the birds, to search for provision for them, 
but, from their own bodies, furnish them with a delicious fluid 
suited to (heir slate, which forms their support till they are 
able to crop and digest the herbage, when they are left to shift 
for themselves. Some arc born move independent of maiernal 



INSTINCT. 327 

care than others ; thus domestic animals, as the calf, the Iamb, 
and the young coh, can move about ahiiost as soon as they are 
born, and can immediately use their organs of sight ; whereas 
the progeny of beasts of prey usually come into the world blind, 
and some time elapses before they can run about, so that the 
dam, if she wishes to remove them, must carry them herself, 
which she generally does, in her mouth. 

As the proper food of herbivorous quadrupeds is almost 
every where abundant, they are soon tempted, without the 
intervention of the mother, to browse upon tlie herbage : but 
the predaceous beast whose food must be pursued and cap- 
tured, takes more pains to instruct her young how to maintain 
themselves ; thus the cat lays the mouse or bird, that she has 
caught, before her kittens ; and it is laughable to observe how 
they are excited, and with what resolution and ferocity the 
Uttle furies endeavour to keep possession of the prey their dam 
has brought to them. 

But of all classes of animals the birds are the most remarka- 
ble for the labours they undergo preparatory to laying their 
eggs. In those that migrate a long aerial voyage is previously 
to be undertaken, the stimulus to w^hich, in the swallow, ap- 
pears to be altogether physical,^ and is probably so in other 
migrators. But what is it that directs them in their flight, 
and enables them to return to the countries from which they 
had migrated ? Did the swallow^ steer her course within sighi 
of land, it might, perhaps, be supposed that her memory was 
her director : but tliese birds are often found at sea, hundreds 
of miles from any shore,^ where, one would think, there could 
be no index either in the clouds or the ocean to instruct her 
which way to steer her adventurous course. The only atmos- 
pheric phenomenon affecting her would be the change of tem- 
perature as she went northward. But we can onl\^ conjec- 
ture in this case — observation, as well as Scripture, tells us, 
indeed, The stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times ; and 
the turtle, and the crane, and the swallow observe the time of their 
coming,'^ but God, who decrees the end, appoints tlie means, 
which often remain amongst his Secret Things. Yet, thougli 
the immediate agent that guides the swallow over the expanse 
of water, from the torrid to the temperate zone is latent, we 
may still inquire, when she has made the shores of Britain, 
what is it timt urges her to seek her old vicinity, and to build 

1 See above, p. 55. See Jenner, Fhdos. Trans. 1824. 20. 

2 Hirundo riislica. 3 P kilos. Trans, nhl an^x. Vi. 
4 Jercin. viii. 7. 



328 INSTINCT. 

her nest in the very spot where she herself first drew breath, 
as Dr Jenner's experiments prove that swallows do 1^ Here 
may we not conjecture that her intellect and memory become 
her guides'? She recognizes the spot in which she committed 
herself to the sea breeze; and there, probably, again flies inland, 
and will have no great difficulty in pursuing the line of coun- 
try which leads to her native village, and to the very roof under 
the eaves of which she was born. 

But of all the instincts of the feathered part of the creation, 
there is none more remarkable, more varied, and more worthy 
of admiration than that which directs them in the situation 
and structure of their nests. — One nidificates upon the ground ;^ 
another under ground, or in the sand f some select the chimney 
or eaves of houses for their clay-built structures;* those gela- 
tinous rjests, which the Chinese epicures and orators so highly 
prize, are formed in caverns and dark places by the little bird^ 
whose work they are. The great majority, however, nidificate 
in trees and bushes, and where they are within reach their nests 
are carefully concealed. 

The structure and materials of nests are also infinitely vari- 
ous, and may be considered to result, as well as all the proceed- 
ings of animals with regard to their young, from an excitement 
analogous to that which Dr Jenner first noticed in the swal- 
low;^ upon which he observes — "The economy of the animal 
seems to be regulated by some external impulse which leads to 
a train of consequences,"'' and which does not cease its action 
till it has accomplished the end for which it was given ; namely, 
the procreation ; ovi position preceded by nidification ; incuba- 
tion ; hatching, or birth ; nutrition and education of the young 
progeny of each individual kind, according to the general law 
of the Creator. 

We know very little of the proceedings of the remaining 
Classes of Vertebrates — which are distinguished by having 
cold blood — the Reptiles, namely, and the Fishes; except that 
they do not feel that instinctive love for their young, after birth, 
exhibited by the quadrupeds and birds. They, however, are 
invariably instructed by the Creator to select a proper place in 
which to deposit their eggs where they can be hatched either by 
artificial or solar heat. Those of some Ophidians, as snakes, 
are buried in sand, and not seldom even in heaps of ferment- 

1 Philos. Trans, ubi supr. 16. 2 Motacilla Troglodytes. 

3 Hirundo riparia. A H. rustica et urbicti. 

5 H escuhnta. 6 PhUos. Trans. 1824. 20. 

7 Ibid. 25. 



INSTINCT. 329 

ing manure; while those of venomous ones are hatched in the 
womb of the dam, and come forth in the serpentine form. The 
Saurians also select a proper place for iheir eggs, and then de- 
sert them; the crocodile buries hers in the sands near the river; 
where many, however, are devoured b\^ tlie icluienmon, and 
its other enemies, and are even relished by man. In the Ba- 
trachian Order one species o( salamander^ commits a single egg 
to a leaf of the Persicaria, which it protects by carefully doubling 
the leaf, and then, proceeding to another, repeats the same 
manoeuvre, till her oviposition is finished:" the toads a.ud frogs 
lay their eggs in the water, the former producing two long 
strings resembling necklaces, formed, as it were, of beads of 
jet, inclosed in crystal; while those of the latter consist of irre- 
gular masses of similar beads. This gelatinous or transparent 
envelope forms the first nutriment of the embryo. The nuptial 
song of the Reptiles is not, like that of birds, th^ delight of 
every heart, but is rather calculated to disturb and horrify than 
to still the soul. The hiss of serpents; the croaking of frogs 
and toads; the moaning of turtles; the bellowing of crocodiles 
and aUigators,^ form their gamut of discords. 

With regard to the Class of Fishesy the general object of 
those that migrate appears to be the casting of their spawn ; 
this it is that causes the different species of the salmon genus to 
leave the sea for the rivers ; for this the hening travels south- 
ward, and the mackarel seeks the north ; all of them guided by 
the law of the Most High, showing itself by an indomitable 
instinct, to seek those stations for oviposition that are best suited 
to the aeration, hatching, and rearing of their spawn ; — but as 
no very striking traits are upon record with regard to the ovi- 
position of fishes, I shall merely refer the reader, u^ith respect 
to the instinct of the migrators, to a former part of the present 
work, where that subject is discussed more at large.* 

Under this head I shall only further notice the numerous 
tribes of the insect world, w^hich have all their seasons, varying 
according to their several destinies, for fulfilling the great law of 
nature, and to which the organization of each species is adapted : 
and when the period for laying their eggs is ai rived each is 
directed to place them where their young, when disclosed, may 
find their appropriate nutriment. From the instance of the 
flesh-fly, above related,^ we learn that it is their scent that 



1 Salamandra platycauda . 2 Edinb. Phil. Journ.'ix.WQ. 

3 See above, p. 17. 4 Ibid. p. 57, 

5 Ibid. p. 311. 
RR 



330 INSTINCT. 

directs insects to a proper etaliori for their eggs. When we 
recollect that every plant, almost, is the destined food of some 
peculiar insect, we may conjecture that the sense of smelling 
must, in them, be far more nice than in the higher animals, so 
as to enable them to distinguish from all others the appropriate 
nuliiment of their own descendants. Where the parent, as is 
sometimes the case, feeds upon the same plant with the chil- 
dren, she requires no such guide, but with respect to the ma- 
jority of insects, especially the infinite host of Lepidoptera, — 
which, after they arrive at their perfect state, never touch what 
forms their nutriment while they are larves, — some such guide 
is absolutely necessary. 

/3. Another Class of Instincts relates to the different modes 
by which animals procure their food. Nothing affords a more 
striking proof of Creative Wisdom, and of the most wonderful 
adaptation of means to an end, than the diversities of structure 
with a view to this particular function. If we consider the 
infinite variety of substances, animal and vegetable, produced 
from the earth, which form the nutriment of its inhabitants — 
some solid and not easily penetrable; others soft and readily 
severed and comminuted ; others again fluid, or semi-fluid; — 
we may conceive what a vast diversity of organs is necessary 
to effect this purpose. To render solid food, of any kind, lit for 
deglutition and digestion, the same mouth must be furnished 
with several kinds of teeth, some for incision, others for lacera- 
tion, others again for grinding and mastication — w^hile those 
that only absorb liquids merely require an organ adapted for 
suction, though often, at the same time, fitted to pierce the 
substance from which the nutritive fluid is to be derived. How 
various, also, must be the organs for swallowing, and digesting 
the food according to its nature; others for elaborating it, and 
abstracting from it all those substances that are required by 
the several systems at work in the body, and conveying them 
to their proper stations ; and the means also for rejecting from 
the body the residuum after the secernment for the above pur- 
poses of the finer life-supporting products. Here are a variety of 
organs, admirable in their structvue, and fitted for action in an 
infinity of ways ; some at the bidding of tlie will stimulated by 
the appetite; others independent of the will, such are the dis- 
tillations, percolations, chemical and electrical processes, con- 
stantly going on in the body of every animal, to separate all 
the products that its nature and functions require, all speak of 
a mechanical agency at work within, not independent in its 



INSTINCT. 331 

operation, but fulfilling a law which must be obeyed.* It has 
been found that Galvanic action will supply the place of the 
loill upon the nerves and muscles, for by it the eyes can be 
opened, and other muscular movements be produced in a dead 
body.^ Sir H. Davy was of opinion that tlie air inspired car- 
ries with it into the blood a subtile or ethereal part probably 
producing animal heat, since those animals that possess the 
highest temperature consume the greatest quantity of air, and 
those that consume the smallest quantity, are cold blooded.^ 

The herbivorous Mammalians are generally not remarkable 
for any artificial means of procuring their food. Providence 
has spread a table before them, and invites them to partake of 
it, without any other trouble, than bending their necks to eat 
it ; but the carnivorous ones, — as their destined pabulum is 
endued with locomotive powers, which enable it often to escape 
from them, and disappoint their expectations, — must have re- 
course to stratagems, and lie in wait for their prey ; these, 
however, consist chiefly in concealing themselves and springing 
suddenly upon it. The fox, of all quadrupeds, is the most 
celebrated for his stratagems and finesse in entrapping his 
game, and his patience is equal to his craft. Some have 
doubted whether this animal Ctnw fascinate poultry, as has been 
often asserted, but I know one instance which fully confirms it. 
A friend of mine one night hearing a noise, upon looking out 
in its direction, saw a fox under the hen-roost, peering up at 
the hens, which both he and his wife, who told me the story, 
saw, as they did also the fox running away, in spite of their 
shouting, with one in his mouth. Indeed, on any other prin- 
ciple we cannot account for his depopulating the hen-roosts in 
the night. 

The birds are less noted, than even the quadrupeds, for their 
stratagems, or any remarkable means of providing food for 
themselves or their young. Those of prey boldly attack and 
seize their destined food wherever they find it ; the owls, indeed, 
like the cats, their analogues, seem to use artifice as njuch as 
strength to attract the mice. The carrion-feeders, as the vul- 
tures and crows, soon discover the carcasses of dead animals.* 
Some of the sea-birds, especially the gulls, indicate the approach 
of bad weather, by leaving the coast., and seeking the interior; 
and, during the intense frosts of a severe winter, the web-footed 

1 See Dr Roget's excellent statements on these subjects, B. T. ii. chap, 
iii. — ix. 

2 See Dr Wilson Philip in Philos. Trans. 1829. 271, 278. 

3 Consolations in Travel, 196, 197. 4 Roget, B. T. ii. 407. 



332 INSTINCT. 

birds and waders, quitting their summer stations in the more 
nonheru regions, fly to the south and seek the unfrozen springs 
and waters of the inland districts, where they find a supply of 
food. Ail these physical actions seem to arise from a physical 
cause, and easily to be accounted for, without having recourse 
to any other. 

With regard to the cold-blooded animals, the fishes and rep- 
tiles, we know but little of their habits in this respect, or of any 
particular stratagems to which they have recourse to procure 
their food. Some of the predaceous fishes, as the pike and 
perch, appear to lie in wait in deep water, and so dart upon 
their prey; others, as the shark, with open mouth pursue and 
devour them ; the fly-catching ones, as the several species of 
the carp and salmon genus,^ are equally upon the watch, but 
nearer the surface, to seize a may-fly^ or ephemera ; the fisii- 
ing-frog^ hangs out its lines in the sea to catch other fishes ; the 
serpents are said to fascinate the birds ; the enormous boa lies 
in wait for the antelopes and other quadrupeds, and coiling 
itself round them in mighty folds, crushes them to render them 
more fit for deglutition ; the Batrachians, Chelonians, and nu- 
merous Saurians are on the alert after insects and small game; 
while the vast and ferocious crocodiles and alligators, looking 
like trunks of trees, lie basking near ihe surface of the water, 
ready to spring upon any large fish, or even man, that may 
chance to come within reach. 

Of all animals, insects afford the most numerous instances 
of instinctive proceedings with this sole end in view; the pit- 
falls of the ant-lion ;* the webs and nets of the various sorts of 
spiders spread over the face of nature; and many more, furnish 
instances of stratagems to secure their daily food; w^hiie an 
infinity of others acquire it, aided only by their senses and 
natural weapons. Let any one look at the prominent eyes, 
tremendous jaws, and legs and wings formed for rapid motion 
on the earth or in t.he air of the tiger-beetles,^ and he will readily 
see that they want no other aid to enable them to seize their 
less gifted prey: and numerous other tribes both on the earih 
and in the water emulate them in these respects. The pacific 
or herbivorous insects also are mostly fitted wilh an extraor- 
dinary acuteuess of certain senses to direct them to tiieir appro- 
priate pabulum. The sight of the butterfly and moth invaria- 
bly leads them to the flowers, to suck whose nectar (heir mul- 

1 Cyprinus and Salmo. '2 Phnjsranta. 

3 Lophius. 4 Mtfimelcon. 

6 Cicindela. 



INSTINCT. 333 

tivalve tubes are given them. The scent of the dung-beetles 
and the carrion-tiies allures them to their respective useful, 
though disgusting, repasts. A very numerous tribe of those 
that derive their nutriment from other animals, neither entrap 
them by stratagem, nor assail them by violence; but, as the 
butterfly and the moth deposit their eggs upon their appropriate 
vegetable, so do these upon their appropriate animal food. Every 
bird almost that darts through the air, every beast that walks 
the earth, every fish that swims in its waters, and almost all 
the lower animals, and even man himself, the lord of all, are 
infested in this way. 

Upon the food of the Crustaceans, Molluscans, and all the 
lower grades of animals, I have before sufficiently enlarged ; I 
need not, therefore, here resume the subject. 

Thus we see the Almighty and All-wise manifests his good- 
ness, as well as his wisdom and power, in providing for the 
wants of all the creatures that he has made ; fitting each with 
peculiar organs adapted to its assigned kind of food, both for 
procuring it, preparing it, digesting it, assimilating if, and for 
rejecting the residuum of all these operations. A physical ac- 
tion upon each of these organs and systems, fitted by him to 
receive and respond to it, is all that the case seems lo require 
in the majority of instances : in those, however, that depend 
upon artifice and stratagem for their food, the exciting cause 
is less obvious. These, indeed, belong to the higher iostincls 
considered under the first head. 

7. That class of Instincts which relates to the hybeimation of 
animals having been considered in another place,^ I shall only 
observe here, that the action of a physical cause is in no de- 
partment of the history of animals more evidently made out. 

My learned friend and coadjutor, Mr Spence, has, in the 
Introduction to Entomology, produced several facts, as not easily 
reconcilable to the hypothesis with respect to the cause of In- 
stinct which I am now considering; and probably a great many 
more might be brought forward ; but my object here is merely 
to consider the general principle ; it would, indeed, be needless 
and endless to discuss particular cases, and fully to account for 
all aberrations, which, in the present state of our knowledge, 
it would not be possible to do. 

But there is one circumstance of a less confined nature, and 
upon which a good deal of the question hinges, to which it 
will be proper to advert. I mean the change that has been 
observed in the nervous system of some insects in their pass- 

1 See above, p. 320. 



334 INSTINCT. 

age from one state to another. It is contended that this change 
has nothing to do with any alterations tiiat then take place in 
their instincts, but only with those in their organs of sense or 
motion/ In confirmaiion of this opinion it is further affirmed, 
that in three whole Orders,^ the structure of the nervous chord 
is not altered, and yet they acquire new instincts. 

But though no change has been noticed to take place in the 
number of ganglions of these orders, there must necessarily be 
a development in those that render nerves to the wings and 
reproductive organs ; so that, though some ganglions may not 
become confluent, as in the Lepidoptera, yet the range of their 
nerves is increased. In this respect, they are in much the 
same situation with the higher animals, though their nervous 
system, as to its organization, undergoes no material change, 
yet from the period of their birth, it is gradually more and more 
developed till they arrive at the age of puberty, when new ap- 
petites are experienced and new powers acquired, not by meta- 
physical, but by physical, action upon their several systems. 
In the three orders referred to by Mr Spence, there is not that 
difference between the different states of the insects that compose 
the majority of them, that there is between those whose pupes 
are not locomotive. The larves of the locust, for instance, are 
stated to emigrate, as well as the perfect insect, and live upon 
the same food ; the only difference is in tiie locomotive and 
reproductive powers of the latter, both of which, as I have 
just said, must be connected with some change in their nervous 
system, operated gradually by a physical agent. 

From what has been stated, with respect to these several 
classes of instincts, it appears, that, as far as can be judged 
from circumstances, they have their beginning in consequence 
of the action of an intermediate physical cause upon the organ- 
ization of the animal, which certainly renders it extremely 
probable that such is the general proximate cause of the phe- 
nomena in question. I would, however, by no means, be un- 
derstood to assert this dogmatically, but merely that it appears 
to me the most probable hypothesis, and most consistent with 
the analogy of the divine proceedings in this globe of ours, as 
well as with his general government of the heavenly bodies ; 
and though I have mentioned heat, electricity, and other ele- 
ments as concerned in the production of these phenomena, yet 
I do not assert that other physical principles may not be com- 
missioned to have a share in it. This field is open both to the 

1 Introd.toEnt..\v.27,2>^. 

2 Viz. Orlhnptera, llemiptcru^ and JVcvrnptcrn 



INSTINCT. 335 

speculatist and experimenter ; lliey may each assist the other 
in traversing and exploring it, and the well known adage, 
Dies diem docety be verified more and more by their united 
edbrts. 

Some may still feel disposed to ask, — Is it within the sphere 
of probability, or even possibility, that by the mere action of 
piiysical powers, however subtile, upon the brain and nerves of 
an animal there should be produced such a wonderful sequence 
of actions and manipulations as we know to be exhibited by 
the beaver, the bee, the spider, and the ant? Actions confess- 
edly above the range of their intellect. But to this I would 
answer, we know that with God all things are possible that do 
not imply a contradiction; and His Wisdom, Power, and Good- 
ness, may be as evidently, and more evidently, manifested, by 
the infinite varieties in the organization necessary to excite the 
appetite for such and such instinctive employments and opera- 
tions ; and to stimulate animals always to run the same pre- 
scribed routine of action from day to day, and year to year ; 
than if he did it by his oicn immediate action upon them, or 
that of his ministering, or other, spirits. 

When we examine a time-piece contrived by a skilful artist, 
containing within it various wheels and other movements, all 
acted upon by one main spring or pendulum ; by means of 
which, influencing all, seconds, minutes, and hours are indi- 
cated as they pass ; and the latter are struck successively, and 
repeated if required : we admire the work, but more the art 
and hand that contrived and executed it ; but our admiration 
would be much diminished, if, instead of these effects being 
produced by the action of a main spring or pendulum upon its 
organization, if I may so call it, it was necessary that the 
maker of the machine, or one of his operatives, should always 
be present to move the hands or strike the hours. So it seems 
most to magnify the Power and Wisdom of the Creator, if we 
suppose him to act by physical means in all cases above the 
intellect of the animal. If he governs the physical universe 
by such means, is it much to suppose, that b}^ the same he 
moves a bird, or a bee, to glorify him by their admirable in- 
stincts 1 Where action is indeed from the Deity upon spirit, as 
upon the soul of man, in a certain sense, it is by spirit ; either 
immediately as by the Holy spirit; or mediately as by an an- 
gelic nature ; hui below spirit, it is surely most consonant to every 
thing that we see and know, that it should be by an agent 
below spirit. 

3. I am now arrived at the last supposition or hypothesis — 



336 INSTINCT. 

that the cause instinct may be compound or mixed — in gome 
respects physical, in others metaphysical. In this case it will 
be subject occasionally to variations from the general law when 
the intelligent agent sees fit. 

But upon this head I shall not be very long, and I only in- 
troduce it here, to show that the Deity sometimes dispenses 
with the general law of instinct, or permits it occasionally to be 
interfered with by the will of the animal, or other agency. All 
animals that exercise instinctive operations, have in their seve- 
ral organs of sensation, certain guides given to enable them to 
fulfil those instincts so as to bring about the purposes of Provi- 
dence. 

Sight, hearing, scent, taste, touch, perception, influence the 
will, and direct each animal to the points in which its instinc- 
tive actions are to commence ; and so far instinct is, as it were, 
mixed with intellect. I have seen it somewhere observed — 
that instinct in conjunction with a principle of limitation, — 
the intellectual faculties f — rules the actions of all sentient and or- 
ganized beings ; just as gravity with the principle of counter- 
action — repulsion — determines the place and composition of all 
inorganic bodies. 

With regard to the Deity, he retains in his hands the power 
of suspending or altering the action of the laws that have re- 
ceived his sanction ; and permits other metaphysical essences 
to do the same. When females overcome that storge or in- 
stinctive love for their offspring, either from the dread of shame, 
or worse motives, and destroy them, in common parlance, we 
say that they were tempted by an evil spirit to commit the 
crime. Mr Bennet, in his interesting Wanderings in JSTew South 
WaleSf (J-c, relates that it is common for the females of the 
oboriginal tribes, if they experience much suffering in their 
labour, to threaten the life of the poor infant, which when born 
they barbarously destroy.* This is a fearful counteraction of 
instinct flowing from an evil source. 

The Deity himself, doubtless when there is — Dignus vindice 
nodus — sometimes suspends the action of an instinct. It is 
related in the Floly Scripture, that when the ark of God was 
taken by the Philistines, in order to ascertain \vheiher the 
plagues that were sent upon them were from God, they yoked 
two milch kine that had calves to the cart in which it was sent 
to Bethshemesh, and the kinc went straight to that place, their 
instinct being mastered by a strong hand, though they went 
lowing after their calves all the way.** Here tiie Deity ruled 

1 I. 122. 2 1 Sam. vi. 7. 12. 



INSTINCT. 337 

the instinct. God interferes with the instincts of aninnals also 
wlien he prescribes their course and sends them in any par- 
ticular direction to answer his purpose : as in the case of the 
prophet Jonah. ^ Properly speaking, those interpositions of the 
Deily by which the law of instinct is suspended, to answer 
a particular purpose of his Providence, like that just related, 
must be regarded as miraculous ; but yet, though unrecorded, 
they may happen oftener than we are aware in the course of 
his moral government ; sometimes perhaps also to remedy some 
physical evil. This appeared therefore a proper place to advert 
to them. 

1 See above, p. 142. 



S3 



CHAPTER XIX. 

Functions and Instincts. Arachnidan, Pseudarachnidan, and 
Jlcaridan Condylopes. 

Having wandered long enough, perhaps loo long, in a wide 
and mazy field, but fertile everywhere in proofs of the Power, 
Wisdom, and Goodness of the Creator, it is time to return to 
the high road from which we diverged. 

The Class of animals which led me into this digression were 
the Myriapods, concerning which I observed, when I com- 
menced my account of them, that on quitting the Crustaceans, 
the way seemed to branch off from the long-tailed Decapods by 
them, and from the short-tailed ones by the Arachnidans. We 
are now then to give a history of the latter Class. 

Latreille, in which he has been followed by most modern 
Arachnologists, in his work in aid of Cuvier's last edition of the 
Rtgne Animal,^ divides his Arachnidans into two Orders, Pul- 
monaries, or those that breathe by gillSf and Trachearies, or those 
that breathe by spiracles in connection with trachece. In his 
latest work,^ which he did not Hve to finish, he added a third 
Order, including some parasites, infesting marine animals, such 
as the whale louse.' These, from their having no apparent 
respiratory apparatus, he named, Aporohranchians. 

As the pulmonary Arachnidans of Latreille differ from Uie 
Trachearies, &c., not only in having their body divided into 
two sections, but likewise both in their respiratory organs and 
those of circulation, I have always regarded them as forming a 
distinct Class.* 

The following characters distinguish this Class : 
Body covered by a coriaceous or horny integument, divided 
into two segments. Head and trunk confiuent so as to form a 
single segment, denominated the Cephalothorax. Eyes, 6 — 8. 



1 Lcs Cruslacia, Ics Arachnidcs, et Ics Inscctes. 

2 Cours ly Entnmoloffic. 

'.] Xymyhcni frrossipcs. \ Introd to I'ni. iii. I'J. 2\ 



ARACHNIDANS. 



339 



Legs, 8. Spinal chord, knotty. A heart and vessels for circu- 
lation. Respiration by gills. Sexual organs, double. 
This Class consists of two Orders. 

1. Araneidans. Integument coriaceous. Mandibles, also 
called cheliceres, consisting of a single joint, armed with a 
claw, perforated near the apex for the transmission of 
venom, and when unemployed folding upon the end of 
the mandible. Gills, 2 — 4. Abdomen united to the trunk 
by afoot-stalk. Anuskumshed with 4 — 6 spinning organs. 

2. Pedipalps.^ Integument horny. Feelers extended before 
the head, armed with a forceps or didactyle claw. Abdo- 
men sessile. Gills, 4 — 8. 

1. Araneidans, or spiders. 

No animals fall more universally under observation than the 
spiders ; we see them everywhere, fabricating their snares or 
lying in wait for their prey, in our houses, in the fields, on the 
trees, shrubs, flowers, grass, and in the earth ; and, if we watch 
their proceedings, we may sometimes see them, without the 
aid of wings, ascend into the air, where, carried by their web 
as by an air-balloon, they can elevate themselves to a great 
height. The webs they spin and weave are also equally dis- 
persed; they often fill the air, so as to be troublesome to us, 
and cover the earth. M. Mendo Trigozo^ relates, that at Lis- 
bon, on the 6th of November 1811, the Tagus was covered, 
for more than half an hour, by these w^ebs, and that innumer- 
able spiders accompanied them which swam on the surface of 
the water. I have in another place^ given an account of the 
instruments by which they weave them; and shall now say a 
few words upon those by which their Creator has enabled them 
to produce the material of which they are formed. 

At the posterior extremity of the abdomen, formed usually 
by a prominence, is the anus, immediately below which, planted 
in a roundish depressed space, are four or six jointed teat-like 
organs, of a rather conical or cylindrical shape. The exterior 
pair is the longest, consisting of three joints ; but these have 
no orifices at their extremity for the transmission of threads : 
the other four* consist each of two joints, and are pierced at 
their extremity with innumerable little orifices, in some species 
amounting to a thousand from each, from which their web 



1 Manipalps would be a more proper term, as the feelers are used for pre- 
hension, not for walking. 

2 Latr. Cours. D'Ent. i. 497. 3 See above, p. 280- 
4 Mammvlm, Jntrod. to Ent. iii. 391. 



340 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

issues at tlieir will, or bristled with an army of infinitely minnle 
biarticulate spinnerets,* each furnishing a thread at their ex- 
tremity. These teats are connected with internal reservoirs, 
which yield the fluid matter forming the thread or web. 
These reservoirs in some species consist of four, in others of siar 
vessels folded several times, and communicating with other 
vessels in which the material that forms their web is first ela- 
borated.^ 

Such are the organs which furnish the material of those 
wonderful and diversified toils which the spiders weave to 
entrap the animals that form their food. 

The threads, after they issue from these organs, are united, 
or kept separate, according to the will or wants of the animal ; 
and it is stated, that from them certain spiders can spin three 
kinds of silk.' Their ordinary thread is so fine, that it would 
require twenty-four united to equal the thickness of that of the 
silkworm. These threads, fine as they are, will bear, without 
breaking, a weight sextuple that of the spider that spins them. 
They employ their web, generally, for three different purposes; 
in the construction of their snares, of their own habitations, 
and of a cocoon to contain their eggs. 

Spiders were divided by the older Arachnologists, after Lis- 
ter, into families according to the mode in which they entrap 
or seize their prey. More modern writers* on the subject, have 
taken their respiratory organs as regulating the primary division 
of the Order: upon this principle, the spiders are formed into 
two tribes, those that have two pairs of gills ;* and those that 
have only one pair.® M. Walckenaer, who has studied the 
Order more than any man in Europe, has not only divided the 
above two tribes into genera, &c., from characters taken from 
their form and organization ; but has also considered them with 
respect to their habits, and under this head, divides them into 
four sections: 

1. Hunters, wandering incessantly to entrap their prey. 

2. Vagrants, watching their prey, concealed or inclosed in a 
nest, but often running with agility. 

3. Sedentaries, forming a web in which they remain im- 
movable. 

4. Swimmers, swimming in the water to catch their pre\% 
and there forming a web. 

1 Fusi, Introd. to Ent. iii. 392. 2 Latr. Cours D'Ent. i. 496. 

3 Blackwall, in Lmn. Trails, xvi. 470. 4 L. Du Four. Latreille. 

r> Tctrapnrumoncs. liatr. T/icraphosa, <Srn. Walck. 

G Dipncumoncs. Latr. Jiranea. Walck. excluding Dysdera. 



arachnidans. 341 

To the first tribe, those, namely, with/owr gills, some spiders 
belong, the instincts of which are very remarkable. One of 
the largest, and most celebrated, is the bird-spider/ It forms 
the tube which it inhabits of a white silk like mushn, which it 
fixes amongst leaves, and in any cavities, and there watches its 
prey ; it is accused by some of destroying even birds, whence 
its name, especially the humming-bird :^ but this rests upon 
questionable authority ; and writers are not agreed as to its 
general habits. Probably several species are confounded under 
the same name. I shall not therefore enlarge further on its 
history; I mention it merely as the largest spider known. 

The proceedings of those called the trap-door spiders^ are 
better authenticated, as those of the mason-spider by the Abbe 
Sauvages,* and those of another species very recently, in the 
annals of the French Entomological Society, by M. V. Audoin, 
one of the most eminent of modern entomologists, under the 
name of the pioneer;^ of his interesting memoir, I shall here 
give a brief abstract. 

Some species of spiders, M. Audoin remarks, are gifted with 
a particular talent for building: they hollow out dens; they 
bore galleries ; they elevate vaults ; they build, as it were, 
subterranean bridges : they construct also entrances to their 
habitations, and adapt doors to them, which want nothing but 
bolts, for without any exaggeration, they work upon a hinge, 
and are fitted to a frame.*' 

The interior of these habitations, he continues, is not less 
remarkable for the extreme neatness which reigns there; what- 
ever be the humidity of the soil in which they are constructed, 
water never penetrates them ; the walls are nicely covered with 
a tapestry of silk, having usually the lustre of satin, and al- 
most always of a dazzling whiteness. He mentions only four 
species of the genus as at present known. One which was 
found in the Island of Naxos ;'' another in Jamaica f a third in 
Montpellier ;•* and a fourth, that which is the subject of his 
Memoir, in Corsica ; to which I may add a fifth species, found 
frequently by Mr Bennet, in different parts of New South 
Wales.^° 

The habitations of the species in question are found in an 

1 Mygale avicularia. 2 Trochilus. 3 Cteniza. 

4 Ct. Sauvagesii. 5 Ct.fodiens. 

6 The French word is feyure, which I cannot find in the dictionaries, but 
it means, the circular frame of the mouth of the tube which receives the door. 

7 Cteniza ariana. 8 Ct. nidvlans. 9 Ct. ccemeniaria. 
10 Wanderings in N. S. Wales, 8^c. i. 328. 



342 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

argillaceous kind of red earlh, in which ihey bore tubes about 
three inches in depth, and ten lines in width. The walls of 
these tubes are not left just as they are bored, but they are 
covered with a kind of mortar, sufficiently solid to be easily 
separated from the mass that surrounds it. If the tube is 
divided longitudinally, besides this rough cast, it appears to be 
covered with a coat of fine mortar, which is as smooth and 
regular as if a trowel had been passed over it; this coat is very 
thin, and soft to the touch ; but before this adroit workman lays 
it, she covers the coarser earthy plaster-work with some coarse 
web, upon which she glues her silken tapestry. 

All this shows that she was directed in her work by a Wise 
Master ; but the door that closes her apartment is still more 
remarkable in its structure. If her well was always left open, 
she would be subject to the intrusion of guests that would not, 
at all times, be welcome or safe; Providence, therefore, has 
instructed her to fabricate a very secure trap-door, which closes 
the mouth of it. To judge of this door by its outward appear- 
ance, we should think it was formed of a mass of earth coarsely 
worked, and covered internally by a solid web; which would 
appear sufficiently wonderful for an animal that seems to have 
no special organ for constructing it : but if it is divided verti- 
cally, it will be found a much more complicated fabric than its 
outward aspect indicates, for it is formed of more than thirty 
alternate layers of earth and web, emboxed, as it were, in each 
other, like a set of weights for small scales. 

If these layers of web are examined, it will be seen that they 
all terminate in the hinge, so that the greater the volume of 
the door, the more powerful is the hinge. The frame in which 
the tube terminates above, and to which the door is adapted, 
is thick, and its thickness arises from the number of layers of 
which it consists, and which seem to correspond with those 
of the door ; hence, the formation of the door, the hinge, and 
the frame, seem to be a simultaneous operation; except that 
in fabricating the first, the animal has to knead the earth, as 
well as to spin the layers of web. By this admirable arrange- 
ment, these parts always correspond with each other, and the 
strength of the hinge, and the thickness of the frame, will 
always be proportioned to the weight of the door. 

The more carefully we study the arrangement of these parts, 
the more perfect does the work appear. If we examine the 
circular margin of the door, we shall find that it slopes inwards, 
so that it is not a transverse section of a cylinder, but of a cone, 
and on the other side, that the frame slopes outwards, so that 
the door exactly applies to il. By this structure, when ihc door 



ARACHNIDANS. 343 

is closed, the tube is not distinguishable from the rest of the soil, 
and this appears to be the reason that the door is formed with 
earth. Besides, by this structure also, the animal can more 
readily open and sliut the door ; by its conical shape it is much 
lighter than it would have been if cylindrical, and so more easily 
opened, and by its external inequalities, and mixture of web, the 
spider can more easily lay hold of it with its claws. Whether 
she enters her tube, or goes out, the door will shut of itself. This 
was proved by experiment, for though resistance, more or less, 
was experienced when it was opened, when left to itself, it al- 
ways fell down, and closed the aperture. The advantage of 
this structure to the spider is evident, for whether it darts out 
upon its prey, or retreats from an enemy, it is not delayed by 
having to shut its door. 

The interior surface of this cover to its tube is not rough and 
uneven like its exterior, but perfectly smooth and even, like the 
walls of the lube, being covered with a coating of white silk, 
but much more firm, and resembling parchment, and remarka- 
ble for a series of minute orifices,* placed in the side opposed to 
the hinge, and arranged in a semicircle; there are about thirty 
of these orifices, the object of which, M. Audoin conjectures, 
is to enable the animal to hold her door down, in any case of 
emergency, against external force, by the insertion of her claws 
into some of them. 

The principal instruments by which this little animal per- 
forms her various operations, are her mandibles or cheliceres, 
and her spinners. The former, besides the two rows of tuber- 
cles, between which, when unemployed, her claw, or sting, is 
folded, has at the apex, on their inner side a number of strong 
spines.2 As no one has ever seen her at work upon her habi- 
tation, it cannot be known exactly how these organs, and pro- 
bably her anterior legs, are employed in her various manipula- 
tions. 

I have, in my collection, a tube or nest of the Jamaica 
trap-door spider,* consisting merely of the web, which is much 
larger than that just described, being more than six inches 
long, and three quarters of an inch in diameter in the narrowest 
part, but near the mouth more than an inch. In this species 
the trap-door is semicircular, having a sloping margin ; it is 
lined, as well as the upper part of the tube, with a strong close 



1 Plate XL b. Fig. 2. a. 

2 Observations sur le nid d'ime Araignee lu a VJicad. des Sc. le 21 Juin 
1820, par M. Victor Audoin: and Ann. dc la Soc. Ent. de France, ii. 69. 

3 Plate XI. b. Fig. 4. 



314 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

web, resembling parchment. I can detect in it no series of 
orifices, but I see here and there httle lioles where the claws 
appear to have been inserted. This door is entirely formed of 
hiyers of web, without any intermixture of earth. 

Mr Bennett, in his Wanderings, <^c.^ gives some interesting 
particulars of the species discovered by him in New South 
Wales. He describes the tube, as about an inch in diameter 
at the mouth, and the Hd as formed of web incorporated with 
earth, and exactly fitting the mouth of the tube, in this resem- 
bling ihe pioneer. He beard of a person who used to amuse 
himself with feeding one of these insects : Avhen its meal was 
finished, it would re-enter its habitation, and pull down the lid 
with one of its claws. He further observes, that to discover 
their habitations when the lid is down, from its being so accu- 
rately fitted to the aperture, was very difficult. 

Though the particulars I have here stated, of the history 
and habits of these subterranean spiders, demonstrate, in every 
respect, as far as we know them, the adaptation of means to an 
end, far above the inteUigence of the animal that exhibits them; 
yet fully to appreciate the Wisdom, and Power, and Goodness, 
that fabricated her, and instigated her to exercise these various 
arts, and to employ her power of spinning webs, in building the 
structures necessary for her security, as well as for the capture 
of her prey, we ought to be witnesses to all her proceedings, 
which would probably instruct us more fully why she forms so 
deep a tube, and one so nicely covered with a peculiar tapestry 
from the mouth to the bottom. One of these ends, is, doubt- 
less, to keep her tube dry. 

2. Various are the modes of capturing their prey, exercised 
by the second Tribe of spiders, which have only two gills, some 
fabricating webs of various kinds for that purpose, and others 
lying in wait for them, and catching them b)'^ mere agility. 
The first of these are called loeavers,^ and the last, hunters^. 

Some of the former construct silken tubes of an irregular 
texture, open at both ends, in which they conceal themselves. 
Of this description is one, remarkable for having only six 
eyes,* which sits at the mouth of her tube, with her four an- 
terior legs out of it, reposing by their extremity upon as many 
fine threads, which diverge from the mouth of the tube as from 
a centre, and probably contribute to form the toils, or are con- 
nected with them, which De Geer observed her to construct in 
front of her den^ and in which large flies are taken, which, by 

1 i. 328. ti Arancidm tcxtona. 3 .^. rmatorKt. 

4 Stgcstria sciiocuUUa. T) vii. iilil. 



ARACHNIDANS. S4t 

means of her stout mandibles, she soon kills, and then sucks 
their juices.* 

Another species,'^ which spins a similar web with, diverging 
threads, forming so many sna'res, is remarkable for the perti- 
nacity with which it clings to its tube. The most effectual way 
to expel it, is to put in a live ant : scarcely has it entered, 
when the spider, in a violent agitation, uses its utmost efforts 
to frighten the intruder ; if the ant disregards its menaces, it 
rushes out precipitately, and does not stop till it is two or three 
inches distant, when it halts to watch the motions of the ant, 
which, usually, when disengaged from the web, falls to the 
ground; upon this taking place, the former re-enters its tube 
backwards. This species, though driven from its habitation 
by so small an insect, will fearlessly attack the largest flies, 
and it has been seen even to seize a very active wasp.^ 

The webs of the retiary or geometric spiders, which belong 
to another division of the weavers, are so well known that it is 
not necessary to give a very detailed account of their proceed- 
ings ; but as Mr. Blackwall, in a very interesting Memoir in 
the Zoological Journal,'^ has added much to our previous know- 
ledge on this head, especially with respect to the spiral circum- 
volutions that distinguish the webs of the tribe in question, I 
shall abstract, as briefly as I can, the main features of his 
account. Having formed the foundation of her net, and drawn 
the skeleton of it, by spinning a number of rays converging to 
the centre, she next proceeds, setting out from that point, to 
spin a spiral line of unadhesive web, like that of the rays, 
which it intersects, and to which she attaches it, and after 
numerous circumvolutions, finishes it at the circumference. 
This line, in conjunction with the rays, serves as a scaffolding 
for her to walk over, and it also keeps the rays properly stretch- 
ed. Her next labour is to spin a spiral or labyrinthiform line 
from the circumference towards the centre, but which stops 
somewhat short of it ; this line is the most important part of 
the snare. It consists of a tine thread, studded with minute 
viscid globules, like dew, which by their adhesive quality re- 
tain the insects that fly into the net. The snare being thus 
finished, the little geometrician selects some concealed spot in 
its vicinity, where she constructs a cell, in which she may 
hide herself, and watch for game ; of the capture of which, she 
is informed by the vibrations of a line of communication be- 
tween her cell and the centie of her snare. 



1 Walck. Araneid. de France. 195. 


2 Segestria perfida. 


3 Walck. Araneid. dc France. 202. 


4 V. 181 


TT 





346 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

The insects that frequent the waters require predaceous asii- 
mals to keep theiu within due limits, as well as tliose that in- 
habit the earth, and the waler-spider^ is one of the most remark- 
able upon whom that office is devolved by her Creator. To 
this end her instinct instructs her (o fabricate a kind'of diving- 
bell \i\ the bosom of tluit element. She usually selects stdl 
waters for this purpose. Her house is an oval cocoon, filled 
with air, and lined with silk, from which threads issue in every 
direction, and are fastened to the surrounding plants; in this 
cocoon, which is open below, she watches for her prey, and 
even appears to pass the winter, when slje closes the opening. 
It is most commonly, yet not always, entirely under water ; 
but its inhabitant has filled it with air for her respiration, 
which enables her to live in it. She conveys the air to it in 
the following manner : she usually swims upon her back, when 
her abdomen is enveloped in a bubble of air, and appears like a 
globe of quicksilver ; with this she enters her cocoon, and dis- 
placing an equal mass of water, again ascends for a second 
lading, till she has sufficiently filled her house with it, so as to 
expel all the water. The males construct similar habitations, 
by the same manoeuvres. How these little animals can enve- 
lope their abdomen with an air-bubble, and retain it till they 
enter their cells, is still one of Nature's mysteries that have not 
been explained. We cannot help, however, admiring and 
adoring the Wisdom, Power, and Goodness manifested in this 
singular provision, enabhng an animal that breathes the atmos- 
pheric air, to fill her house with it under the water; and which 
has instructed her in a secret art, by which she can clothe part 
of her body with air, as with a garment, which she can put oflf 
when it answers her purpose. This is a kind of attraction and 
^•epulsion that mocks all our inquiries. 

Amongst the spiders called the hunters, and the vagrants, 
some seize their prey like the lion or the tiger, with the aid of 
few or no toils, by jumping upon them, when they come within 
their reach. 1 have often observed a white or yellowish species 
of crab-spider^ — a tribe so called because their motions resem- 
ble those of crabs — which lies in wait for her prey in the blos- 
soms of umbelliferous and other wiiite-blossomed plants, and 
can scarcely be distinguished from them, which when a fly or 
other insect alights upon the flower, darts upon it before she is 
perceived. 

There is a very common black and white spider,^ amongst 

1 Jlrgyroncta aquatica. 2 Related probably to Thomisus cUrexis. 

3 Salticus scmicus. 



ARACHNIDANS. 347 

(he vagrants, which may always be seen in summer, on sunny 
rails, window-sills, &c.: when one of ihese spiders, which are 
always upon the watch, spies a fly or a gnat at a distance, he 
approaches softly, step by step, and seems to measure the in- 
terval that separates him from it with his eye ; and, if he judges 
tliat he is within reach, first fixing a thread to the spoi on 
which he is stationed, by means of his fore-feet, which are 
much longer and larger than the others, he darts upon his vic- 
tim with such rapidity, and so true an aim, that he seldom 
misses it. Whether his station is vertical or horizontal is of 
little consequence, he can leap equally well from either, and 
in all directions. He is prevented from falling, by the thread 
just mentioned, which acts as a kind of anchor, and enables 
him to recover his station, when without such a help he would 
be, as it were, driven out to sea. 

We see in these latter instances, that though the art and 
means of weaving snares to entrap their prey have not been 
granted to these hunters and vagrants, yet that their Creator 
has endowed them with increase of agility, and the power of 
moving, without turning round, in all directions, which fully 
make up to them for that want. 

Before I conclude this history of spiders, I must mention a 
very remarkable one, described and figured by Freycinet, un- 
der the name of Aranea notacantha,^ but which appears to belong 
to no known genus of the Order. It is stated to have at its 
posterior extremity a long cylindrical tube, terminated by two 
eyes! ! But this, surely, must be a mistake. At the anterior 
part of the thorax are four eyes, in a square, and one on each 
side. The form of the abdomen and its tube are very remark- 
able. This spider was found in a small island near Port Jack- 
son, in an irregular web attached to the shrubs. 

2. The Pedipalps, forming the second Order of Arachnidans, 
will not detain us long. The principal animals belonging to 
it, are the scorpions, which are not only remarkable for the 
powerful organs by which they are enabled to seize their prey, 
but also for their jointed tail terminating in a deadly sting. 
Their aspect alone, when they are moving with their open for- 
ceps advanced before their head, and their tail turned over it, 
is enough to create no little alarm in the beholder ; and if he 
were told that one genus of the tribe goes by the name of man- 
killer,^ and should read in Aristotle, that though some were 



1 Platk XI. Fm. 2. 2 Androciomit. 



348 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

harmless, tlie sting of others was fatal both to man and beast,^ 
the degree of his alarm would not be diminished. But though 
the venom of these creatures, when provoked and put upon 
self-defence, may sometimes prove fatal to man and the higher 
animals, yet this is not the main purpose for which their Cre- 
ator has given them such means of annoyance. Their food 
consists of various beetles and other insects, arachnidans, and 
w^ood-lice ; many of which they could not easily master and 
devour, after they have seized them with their forceps, with- 
out the aid of their tail and its sting ;^ this they can turn over 
their head, and moving it in any direction, immediately kill their 
prey, however strong and active, by the fatal venom it instils. 

Our Saviour alludes to the scorpion as one of the symbols of 
the evil spirit: and as a zodiacal sign with the Egyptians, it 
represented Typhon, which seems to prove that our Saviour's 
application of it was in conformity with a current opinion. 

The other Pedipalps,^ though one of them has a jointed tail 
like the scorpions,* are not armed with a sting. Probably the 
animals that they feed upon offer less resistance than the prey 
of the latter. *» 

With regard to the Arachnidans in general, the object of 
their creation appears to have been to assist in keeping within 
due bounds the insect population of the globe. The members 
of this great and interesting Class are so given to multiply 
beyond all bounds, that were it not for the various animals 
that are directed by the law of their Creator to make them 
their food, the whole Creation, at least the organized members 
of it, would suffer great injury, if not total destruction, from 
the myriad forms that would invest the face of universal nature 
with a living veil of animal and plant devourers. To prevent 
this sad catastrophe, it was given in charge to the spiders, to 
set traps everywhere, and to weave their pensile toils, from 
branch to branch, and from tree to tree, and even to dive under 
the waters. And, more particularly, to them we are mainly 
indebted for our deliverance from a plague of flies of every de- 
scription, which, if the spiders were removed, of which they 
form the principal food, would subject us to incredible annoy- 
ance.5 

The scorpions, and other Pedipalps, are found only in warm 
climates, where they are often very numerous, and, like the 
centipedes, creep into beds.^ Insects multiply, beyond con- 

1 Hist. Animal. 1. viii. c. 39. Comp. JV. D. D'Hist. JVflf. xxx. 431. 

2 See above, p. 312. 3 Phnjnus, S^. 

4 ThdypKmius. 5 See above, p. 225 



ARACHNIDANS. 349 

ception, in such climates, and unless Providence had reinforced 
his army of insectivorous animals, it would have been impossible 
to exist in tropical regions. The animals we are speaking of, 
not only destroy all kinds of beetles, grass-hoppers, and other 
insects, but also their larves, and even eggs. 



Pseudarachnidan Condylopes. 

This Class, which is formed from the Tracheary Jlrachnidans 
of Latreille, differs from the preceding principally in the organs 
of Respiration and Circulation, 

Body coriaceous, or crustaceous. Spiracles connecting with 
trachex for respiration. Circulation obscure. Eyes 2 — 4. Legs 
6 — 8. Sexual ogans single. 

The Class consists of two Orders, perfectly analogous to 
those of the Arachnidans, which may be denominated, Pseudo- 
scorpions and Phalangidans. 

1. Pseudo-scorpions. Body oblong, divided into several seg- 
ments. Eyes 2 — 4. Legs 6 — 8. 

2. Phalangidans. Body consisting of one segment, with 
the analogue of the abdomen consisting of folds. Eyes 2. 
Legs 8, elongated. 

1. I have already given an account of the most interesting 
genus of this Order, the Solpuga, on a former occasion ;^ and 
there is Httle known of the history of the 5oofc-cra6s/ except 
thal^they are often found in books ; I have also occasionally 
met With them in the drawers of my insect cabinets, moving 
slowly on, with their arms expanded, probably they were in 
search of the mite that is so injurious to specimens of insects; 
they are also often found upon flies. One genus,^ in this tribe, 
has four eyes, all the rest of the Class have only tioo. 

2. The most remarkable genus* of the second Order of Pseu- 
darachnidans is one described in the Linnean Transactions,^ in 
which the posterior legs exhibit a raptorious character, and 
seem fitted either to seize or retain their prey. The common 
Phalangidans, or harvest-men, have been treated of in another 
place. ^ 

The animals of this class seem to be universally insectivor- 
ous, though fabricating no snares, 

1 See above, p. 234. 2 Chelifer. 

3 Ohisium. 4 Gonyleptes. K. 

5 xii. 450. t. xxii,/. 16. 6 See above, p. 237. 



350 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 



Acaridan Condylopes. 

We are now arrived at a Class of Condylopes, that, with 
respect to their food^ have a much more extensive commission 
ihan those which we have lalely considered, the Arachnidan«, 
and Psendarachnidans. Under the name of mites they are 
universally known, and wlien some of our most essential arti- 
cles of food, as clieese and flour, get old, or in any degree 
musty, they soon swarm with these minute animals, which, 
wherever they are established, multiply beyond conception; 
mites also attack tiot only decaying substances, but also living 
ones; in man they are the cause of a most revolting distem- 
per ;^^under the name of ticks they attack dogs and other ani- 
mals, and few insects altogether escape from their annoyance; 
and they not only infest the inhabitants of the earth and air, 
but are also found swimming in every pool ; so that their field 
of action seems to be the whole creation of organized beings. 

The class may be thus characterized : 

Body without any insection or impression marking out its 
parts, consisting of a single segment, and without folds. 
JWouth and organs various. Eyes 2. Legs 6 — 8, short. 

Latreillehas divided this Class, including in it the preceding 
one, into seven FamiHes ; but perhaps it would be better to con- 
sider it as divided into two Orders, mites,^ and ticks,^ or those 
that do not suck their food, and those that are fitted with an 
organ adapted to suction. 

I shall select an instance or two from animals of this Class, 
which show the care of the Creator, for these little beings ap- 
parently so low in the scale of Creation ; His foresight of every 
circumstance in which they would be placed; and His adapta- 
tion of their structure to their assigned station. 

This is particularly conspicuous in the case of a species of 
bat-mite,* which was first noticed by one of our most cele- 
brated microscopical observers, Mr Baker, and has since Allien 
urjder the notice of M. V. Audoin, well known for his acute 
investigation of the external parts of Insects, who kindly sent 
me a memoir of his on this and other Acaridans, extracted 
from the Annales des Sciences JSTatiirelles for the year 1832. If 
we consider the animal that this mite inhabits, the bat, and 
that it aflbrds much less shelter than the birds, to any parasite 
that may be attached to it, especially as (he species that I am 

I See TAeLrtncf/, i. 1834-5. 59. 2 Jlcfiri. 

3 Ricini. 4 Ptcroptes. 



ARACHNIDANS. 351 

speakitjg of is stated usually to fix itself to the membrane of 
liie wings, which being a naked membrane, would seem to 
expose it to be easily shaken oil" when the animal is flying : we 
easily comprehend (hat it stands in need of some particular 
provision to coiuiieract this circumstance. 

Like those of many other mites, its feet are furnished with a 
vesicle which is capable of contraction and dilatation, and 
which the animal can probably use as a sucker to fix itself; 
but if by any sudden jerk it is unfixed, to prevent its falling-, it 
is gifted with the power of turning upwards, in an instant, 
two, four, six, or even all its legs, according to circumstances, 
sufi^iciently to support itself, and can walk in this position, as 
it were upon its back, as well as it does in the ordinary way 
with th.at part upwards; it may be often seen with four turned 
upwards wliile it walks upon the other four,^ so that it is ready, 
upon any accident, instantaneously to use them, and to lay 
hold of the wing. 

The bat is infested by another parasite, placed by Dr Leach 
at the end of the Acaridans, and by Latreille, but not without 
hesitation, after the Diptera. I may therefore be justified in 
introducing the animal in question here, since, inhabiting the 
same subject, their proceedings will serve to illustrate each 
other, and to demonstrate the agency and design of the Su- 
preme Cause in the concurring structure of these parasites. 
The one I here allude to may be called the bat-louse.^ La- 
treille, who has described very minutely a species of this genus,^ 
informs us that their head is implanted in a singular situation, 
the back of the thorax, between the middle and the anterior 
extremity,* immediately behind the part to which the anterior 
legs are at Inched. The middle of the back, in the common 
species, presents a cavity, which terminates posteriorly in a 
kind of pouch, ^ so that the head can be thrown back and its 
extremity received by it. From this situation, it is evident 
that the animal cannot take its nutriment from the bat in the 
ordinary position, with the back upwards; it must, therefore, 
necessarily stand with it downwards when engaged in suction. 
When rmder the forming hand of the Almighty Creator, its legs 
were plaiiicd, it was not on the lower side of \he trunk, as they 
usutdly are in other hexapods, but on the upper side or margin 
'of that p;irt." Colonel Montague observes, — " So strange and 

1 Baker on Micr. ii. 407. t. xv./. e. f. g. 

2 JVyctcribia , Lat. 3 JY. Blainvillil. 

4 See Montague. Linn. Trans, xi. t. iii./. 5 

5 N. FcrpcrUUonis. 6 A\ D. D'Hist. Nat. xxxiii. 131, 132. 



352 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

contradictory to experience is the formation of this Insect, that 
were it not for the structure of the legs, no one could doubt 
that the upper was actually the under part of the body.^ From 
the account given by the last acute and indefatigable naturalist, 
the motions of this little creature are so rapid as to be almost 
like flight, and it can fix itself in an instant wherever it pleases. 
Putting some into a phial, their agility was inconceivable; not 
being able, like other Dipterous insects, to walk upon the glass, 
their elTorts were confined to laying hold of each other, and 
during the struggle they appeared flying in circles."'* 

Their head is furnished with antennae and feelers, imme- 
diately below the insertion of the former, on each side, is a 
slightly prominent eye, so that they have sight to guide them 
in their motions, which the bat-mite appears to be without. 

I may conclude this account with the pious reflection of the 
worthy author lately mentioned. The very singular structure 
of this insect, which, at first, appears to be a strange deformity 
in nature, and excites our astonishment, will, like all other 
creatures, constructed by the same Omnipotent hand, be found 
to be most admirably contrived for all the purposes of its crea- 
tion ; and the scrutinizing naturlist will soon discover this 
unusual conformation to be the character which at once stamps 
its habits and economy.^ 

One of the most singular animals of this Class is one called 
the vegetating mite.* These are fixed for a time, by an anal 
thread, to certain beetles, by means of which, as by an umbi- 
lical chord, they derive their nutriment from them. After a 
certain time, they disengage themselves, and seek their food 
in the common way of their tribe. 

It is diflScult to say where Latreille's Order of Aporohran- 
chians^ should properly be placed. Savigny considers them as 
leading from the Crustaceans to the Arachnidans by Phalan- 
gium. If they are parasitic upon marine animals, as there is 
reason to believe, might they not, in some sort, be regarded as 
one of those branches, which, without going by the regular 
road, form a link between tribes apparently distant from each 
other 1° They seem, in some respects at least, to present an 
analogy, if not an affinity, to the Hexapod parasites, the bird- 
louse,'^ &c. I offer this merely as a conjecture. 

1 Linn. Tr. xi. 12. 2 Ibid. 13. 3 Ibid. 

4 Uropoda vegetans. 5 JVympJion. Pycnogonum, &c. 

6 See above, p. 198. 7 Mrmus. 



CHAPTER XX. 



Functions and Instincts, Insect Condylopes. 

The animals of the class we are next to consider, have been 
regarded by many modern zoologists, especially of the French 
school, as inferior both to Crustaceans and Arachnidans, on 
account of their having only, as it were, a rudimental heart, 
exhibiting indeed a kind of systole and diastole, but unaccom- 
panied by any system of vessels by which the blood might cir- 
culate in them. A learned nnd acuie writer, and eminent 
zoologist, amongst our own countrymen, has with great force 
controverted the justice of this sentence of degradation pro- 
nounced upon Insects; an opinion which has also been em- 
braced by many other modern writers on the subject, and con- 
siderable doubt has been shown to rest upon the main founda- 
tions upon which the illustrious and lamented Baron Cuvier, 
who was the father of the hypothesis, had built it.* 

But the important discoveries of Dr Carus, who first proved 
that a circulation really exists in various larves of Insects, and 
afterwards that it is also discoverable in several perfect ones,^ 
have placed the matter beyond all doubt. Taking, therefore, into 
consideration the nervous system of Insects, as well as those of 
circulation and respiration, as ought, in all reason, to be done 
— for upon comparison of these three systems so intimately 
connected with life and sensation, surely the first place is due 
to that by which alone the animal is conscious of its existence 
and that of the world it inhabits, and is enabled to run the 
race appointed by its Creator ; surely if even no Carus had 
appeared to demonstrate the existence of a circulation in these 
animals, still the perfection of their nervous system, compared 
with that of the Molluscans, in determining their respective 
stations, would be a sufficient counterpoise to a heart and vas- 
cular system for circulation ; and if to this superiority we add 

1 Mac Leay, Hor. Entomolog. 204, 297. 

2 Jntrod. to Comp. Anat. E. T. by Gore, ii. 392. £ct. Mad. Cccs JVat. Cur. 
XV, ii. 

UU 



354 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

the number and nature of the several organs by which this 
system acts, and the fruits of such agency in the activity and 
various instincts of the animals endowed with it, embodying 
the moving will, the informing sense, the impelling appetite, 
compared with the inertness and sluggish motions, and apa- 
thetic existence, and paucity of instinctive actions in the great 
majority of the Molluscans, — who is there that will hesitate to 
conclude that he who created the Insect world, gifted them 
with so many and such wonderful instincts, inspired them with 
such incessant activity, fitted them with such various organs 
for such a diversity of locomotions under the earth, on the 
earth, in the air and in the water, meant to place them far 
above the headless Oyster, with scarcely any organs of sensa- 
tion, and scarcely any motion but that of opening and shutting 
its shell, or even than the Cuttle-fish, though furnished with 
eyes, and even three hearts, and a very extraordinary animal, yet 
destitute of many organs of the senses and of locomotion found 
in Insects, and most of those that they have not formed upon 
the plan of the higher animals, but rather borrowed from the 
confessedly lower Classes of Polypes and Radiaries P 

With regard to the Crustaceans and Jlrachnidans, setting 
aside the superiority of Insects in their instincts, the single cir- 
cumstance of the reproduction of mutilated organs in the former 
seems to prove an inferiority of rank and a tendency towards 
the Polype. 2 

When we consider attentively these little beings, the infinite 
variety of their forms, the multiphcity and diversity of their 
organs, whether of sense or motion, of offence or defence, for 
mastication or suction ; or those constructed with a view to 
their several instincts, and the exercise of those functions de- 
volved upon them by the wisdom of their Creator ; the difler- 
ent kinds also of sculpture which is the distinction of one 
tribe, and of painting, which ornaments another, the brilliant 
colours, the metallic lustre, the shining gold and silver with 
which a liberal and powerful hand has invested or bespangled 
numbers of them ; the down, the hair, the wool, the scales, with 
which He, who careth for the smallest and seemingly most 
insignificant works of his hand, hath clothed and covered them; 
when all these things strike upon our senses, and become the 
subject of our thoughts and reflection, we find a scene passing 
before us far exceeding any, or all of those, that we have hith- 
erto contemplated in our progress from the lowest towards the 
highest members of the animal kingdom, and which for i(s 

1 See above, p. 163. 2 Mac Lcay, llor. Ent. 200. 'JlK-. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. S55 

extent, and the myriads of its mustered armies, each corps dis- 
tinguished as it were by its own banner, and under its proper 
leaders, infinitely outnumbers all the members of the higher 
Classes, which stand as it were between aquatic and terres- 
trial animals, many of its tribes under one form inhabiting the 
water, and under another the earth and the air. 

The following characters distinguish this great Class : 
Body, covered with a horny or coriaceous integument. Spi- 
nal chord knotty, terminating anteriorly in a bilobed brain ; a 
heart and imperfect circulation^ sometimes vascular, and some- 
times extra-vascular ; respiration by trachece, receiving the air 
by spiracles ; legs jointed, in the perfect insect always six. 

The Class of Insects may be divided into two Sub-classes,^ 
viz. Ametabolians, or those that do not undergo any metamor- 
phosis, and have no wings ; and Metabolians, or those that un- 
dergo a metamorphosis, and are usually fitted with wings in 
their final state. 

Sub-class 1. — Jlmetabolians are further subdivided into two 
Orders, Thysanurans and Parasites. 

Order 1. — The Thysanurans are remarkable for their anal 
appendages, which consist either of jointed organs resembling 
antennae, and approaching very near to the caudal organs of 
the cockroach,^ the use of which is not certainly known; or of 
an inflexed elastic caudal fork bent under the abdomen, which 
enables them to leap with great agility. To the first of these 
tribes belongs the common sugar-louse,^ and to the last the 
spring-tails.'^. 

It must be observed, however, that this is not a natural Or- 
der, for there is no analogy between the jointed tails of the 
sugar-louse, which some have supposed to belong or approach 
to the Orthoptera, and the unjointed leaping organ of the spring- 
tail. The latter animals, indeed, seem to form an osculant 
tribe, without the pale of the Class of Insects, and perhaps 
having some reference to the Chilopodans amongst the Myria- 
pods, with which they agree, in having only simple eyes, like 
spiders, on each side of the head. Those of the spring-tails 
consist of eight such eyes, arranged in a double series, and 
planted in an oval space, in shape resembling an Insect's eye. 
The Chilopodans have only four on each side. The Insects 
of this Order probably feed upon detritus, whether animal or 

1 See above, p. 198. 2 Blatta. 

3 Lepisma. 4 PodurUy Sminthurug. 



356 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

vegetable, their masticating organs being very weak, and fitted 
to comminute only putrescent substances. 

Order 2. — The Order of Parasites — consisting of the most 
unclean and disgusting animals of the whole Class, infest both 
man, beast, and bird, and no less than four* species, accounted 
by Linne, &c. as varieties, being attached to the former — may 
be divided into two sections, those that live by suction, and 
those that masticate their food. To the first of these belong 
the human and the dog-louse, and to the other the various 
lice that inhabit the birds,^ of which almost every species has 
a peculiar one. 

I have, on a former occasion, alluded to the Order of Para- 
sites, when speakingof punitive animals:^ here I must observe, 
that like other instruments employed by God to visit ihe sins 
of mankind, they are intended to produce a sanative effect, as 
well as to punish.* It is generally known that I iiey abound 
only on those whose habits are dirty, in whom they may pre- 
vent the diseases which such habits would otherwise generate, 
as well as stimulate them to greater attention to personal clean- 
liness. The bird-louse is probably useful to birds in devouring 
the sordes which must accumulate at the root of their plumes. 

Sub-class. 2. — MetabolianSf by most modern writers on In- 
sects, are considered, from their oral organs, as constituting 
two Sections, which are denominated Haustellate and Mandibu- 
late Insects. I may here observe that the instrument of suc- 
tion in a Haustellate mouth consists of pieces, though differently 
circumstanced, precisely analogous to those employed in mas- 
tication in a JMandibulate one, which has been most satisfac- 
torily demonstrated, and with great elegance, by M. Savigny, 
in the first part of his Jlnimaux sans Vertlbres.^ 

As there are several Orders called Osculant, that are inter- 
mediate between these Sections, I shall arrange the whole in 
three columns. 

OSCULANT ORDERS. 

1. Aphaniptera. 

2. Homaloptera. 

3. Trichoptera. 

4. Dermaptera. 

5. Strepsiptera. 

1 Pediculus, Capitis, Corporis, Mgritarum, and Phthirus Pubis. 

3 Nirmus. 3 See above, p. 7. See Introd. to Knt. i. 83. 

4 Ibid, p. 253. f. t i.— iv. 



INSECT CONDYLOPKS. 357 

HAUSTELLATE ORDERS. MANDIBULATE ORDERS. 

6. Diptera. 10. Hywenoptera. 

7. Lepidoptera. 11. JYcuroptera. 

8. Homoptera. 12. Orthoptcra. 

9. Hemiptera. 13. Coleoptera. 

With regard to the characters of these Orders : 

Order 1. — The Aphaniptera {Flea, Chigoe) are apterous and 
parasitic, but differ from the Order of Parasites by undergoing 
a metamorphosis. They connect the Suctorious Parasites with 
the Diptera. 

Order 2. — The Homaloptera {Forest-fly^ <^c.) called also Pu- 
piparay because their eggs are halched in the matrix of the 
mother, where they pass their larve state, and are not excluded 
till they have become pupes. Most of them have two wings, 
but one genus is apterous :^ these seem intermediate between 
certain Acaridans, as the bat-mite, and the Diptera; they seem 
also, in some respects, to connect with the Arachnidans, whence 
they have been called spider-flies. 

Order S. — The Trichoptera { C as eworm- flies) have four hairy 
membranous wings, in their nervures resembling those of Le- 
pidoptera, the under ones folding longitudinally. The mouth 
has four palpi, but the masticating organs are merely rudi- 
mental. Their place seems to be somewhere between the 
saw-flies and those moths whose caterpillars clothe themselves 
with different substances. 

Order 4. — The Dermaptera {Earwigs) have two elytra and 
two wings of membrane, folded longitudinally, and their tail is 
armed with a forceps. They appear to be between the Cole- 
optera and Orthoptera. 

Order 5. — The Strepsiptera {Wild bee-fly, Wasp-fly), para- 
sitic animals, that have two ample wings, forming the quad- 
rant of a circle, and of a substance between coriaceous and 
membranous, and two elytriform subspiral organs, appendages 
of the base of the anterior legs. Their place is uncertain, 
some placing them between the Coleoptera and Dermaptera; 
and others between the Lepidoptera and Diptera. 



Order 6. — The Diptera {Two-winged Flies and Gnats, &c.), 
as their name indicates, have only two membranous wings, usu- 
ally accompanied by two winglets, representing the under wings 
of the Tetrapterous Orders, and two poisers, which appear con- 
nected with a spiracle. 

1 Melophagus. The Sheep-louse. 



358 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Order 7. — The Lepidoptera {Butterflies" and Moths) have/oitr 
membranous wings, covered with minute scales, varying in 
shape. 

Order 8. — The Homoptera ( Tree-Locusts, Frog-hoppers, Froth- 
hoppers) have four deflexed wings, often of a substance between 
coriaceous and membranous. 

Order 9. — The Hemiptera {Bugs, &c.) have four organs of 
flight, the upper pair being horny or coriaceous, but tipped, in 
the generahty, with membrane, the lower pair being mem- 
branous. 



Order 10. — The Hymenoptera {Saw Flies, Gall Flies, Ichneu- 
mon Flies, Bees, Wasps, Ants, &c.), which are the analogues of 
the Diptera, have four membranous wings, and the tail of the 
female is usually armed with a sting, or instrument useful in 
laying their eggs. 

Order 11. — The J^europtera {Dragon Flies, Lace-winged 
Flies, Ephemeral Flies, White Ants, &c.) have four membranous 
wings, usually reticulated by numerous nervures, but no sting 
or ovipositor. They are analogues, especially Ascalaphus, of 
the Lepidoptera. 

Order 12. — The Orthoptera {Cockroaches, Locusts, Praying- 
insects, Spectres, Grasshoppers, Crickets, &c.) have mostly two 
tegmina, or upper wings, of a substance between coriaceous 
and membranous, and two under ones, formed of membrane, 
and folded longitudinally when unemployed. These are ana- 
logues of the Homoptera. 

Order 13. — The Coleoptera {Beetles) have two upper organs, 
of a horny or leathery substance, called elytra, to cover their 
two membranous wings, which are folded longitudinally and 
transversely. These are analogues of the Hemiptera, especially 
those with no apical membrane. 



In considering the three descriptions of Orders here enume- 
rated and characterized, it must be recollected that we are 
not following the usual order of arrangement in systems, that 
of descending from the highest to the lowest; but that we are 
ascending in an inverse direction, consequently that, in the 
above tables, the lowest numbers indicate the loicest and not 
the highest Orders. 

I shall now make some remarks, as to their functions and 
uses, upon the animals constituting these several Orders, en- 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 359 

livening them occasionally with such histories, not before pro- 
duced, or not well known, as may interest the reader and an- 
swer the great end of this treatise, the glory of God, as mani- 
fested in the history and instincts of animals. 

Before, however, I enter upon the separate consideration of 
these Orders, I must premise a few remarks upon the circum- 
stance which distinguishes them from the preceding Sub-class, 
their metamorphoses. I have, on a former occasion,^ mentioned 
some beneficial effects resulting from this law of the Creator; 
and its action and the results of it have been so ably explained 
and illustrated in another treatise,^ that it is quite unnecessary 
for me to enter largely into the subject. The striking remarks 
made upon the developments of the higher animals, towards 
the close of the treatise alluded to,^ merit particular attention. 

It has been observed by an ingenious and learned writer* on 
this subject — that every species of plant, in the course of the 
year, exhibts itself in different states. First are seen the suc- 
culent stems adorned with the young foliage, next emerge the 
buds of the flowers, then the calyx opens, and permits the ten- 
der and lovely blossoms to expand. The insects destined to 
feed upon each plant must be simultaneous in their develop- 
ment. If the butterfly came forth before there were any flowers, 
she would in vain search for the nectar that forms her food ; 
and if the caterpillar was hatched after the leaves had begun 
to fade and wither, she could not exercise her function.^ In 
another passage he thus illustrates this analogy between the 
metamorphoses of the insect and the successive developments of 
the plant. If we first place an egg, says he, next to its cater- 
pillar, further on its chrysalis, and lastly the butterfly ; what 
have we but an animal stem, an elongation perfectly analogous 
to that of the plant proceeding from its seed, by its stem and 
its appendages to the bud, the blossom, and the seed again ^^ 
For the different kinds and forms of larves and pupes I must 
refer the reader to another work,'' merely observing that, in 
their forms, the larves seem to represent all the preceding 
Classes of Condylopes, and also some Annelidans and MoUus- 
cans. The great majority of pupes are not locomotive, and 
take no food, while the rest are locomotive and continue to 
feed. This circumstance sometimes exposes the former to the 
attacks of their enemies, the ichneumons, and thus numbers 
are destroyed which would otherwise escape ; but though, in 

1 See above, p. 201. 2 Roget. B. T. i. 302—316. 3 Ibid. ii. 63 L 

4 Dr Virey. 5 JV. D. D'H. JV. xx. 348. 

6 Ibid. 355. 7 Introd. to Ent. iii. Lett. xxx. xxxi. 



360 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

this state, they are thus exposed to the attack of one enemy, 
they are more effectually concealed from those of another, the 
insectivorous birds. Those that bury themselves in the earth 
seem still more privileged from attack. 

Orders 1, 2, and 6. There is so close a connection between 
the fleas, the pupiparous insects, and the two-winged flies, that it 
will be best to consider them under one head. The former of 
these, the fleas,^ the mosquitoes, or gnats'* and the horse-flies,'* 
all suck the blood of man, as well as that of beast or bird.* 
The wonderful strength and agility of the^ea are well known, ^ 
and it appears to have been endowed with those faculties by its 
Creator, to render its change of station from one animal to 
another, and means of escape, more easy ; and thougfi the bite 
of mosquitoes, and other blood-suckers, is, at certain times 
of the year and in certain climates, an almost intolerable an- 
noyance f yet, doubtless, some good end is answered by it ; 
with regard to cattle, it is evident that, while they are suffering 
from the attack of these blood-letters, their feeding is more or 
less interrupted ; a circumstance which may be attended by 
beneficial effects to their health ; and probably even to man, 
the torment he experiences may be compensated, in a way that 
he is not aware of, on account of which, principally, a wise 
Physician prescribed the painful operation, and furnished his 
chirurgical operators with the necessary and indeed most curi- 
ous knives and lancets. 

Another group connecting the bat-mite and bat-louse, and the 
Arachnidans, perhaps, with the Diptera, are those two-winged 
insects, called pupiparous or nymphiparous, because their young 
when extruded from the abdomen of the mother, though ap- 
pearing like eggs, are really in the state of nymph or pupe. It 
is remarked of this group, which is parasitic upon beasts and 
birds, that its internal structure is particularly accommodated 
to this circumstance ; it is furnished with a regular matrix, 
consisting of a large musculo-membranous pocket, and with 
ovaries totally different from those of other insects ; but, by their 
configuration and position, exhibiting a considerable resem- 
blance to those of a woman.'' The reason of this singular 
aberration from the gestation of other Diptera, which, with few 
exceptions, are oviparous, seems connected with their peculiar 

1 Pulex. 2 Culcx. 

;i Tabanus. Stomoxys. 4 Tntrod. to Ent. 1. 100, 100, 112, &c. 

5 Ihid. ii. 310. iv. 195. Ibid. 113. 

7 Latr. Crust. Arachn. et Ins. ii. 542. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 361 

habits: in tlieir perfect slate (hey are usually winged, and at- 
tach themselves externally to horses, oxen, &c. ; it may there- 
lore be the means of preserving the race from extinction, that 
they are supported in (he womb of their mo(her, in some in- 
scrutable way, during their grub s(a(e, and only leave her when 
their next change will enable them readily to attach themselves 
to their destined food. 

The gad-flies,^ though they do not, like the forest flies, nour- 
ish their young in their own womb; yet their Creator instructs 
some of them to deposit their eggs in a situation where means 
are provided for ther conveyance to a more capacious matrix, 
ministering to them a copious supply of lymph, which forms 
their nutriment, in the stomach and intestines of the horse, for 
this animal, with its own mouth, licks off the eggs, wisely at- 
tached, by this fly, to the hairs of its legs in such parts as are 
exposed to this action ; and thus unwittingly, itself conducts its 
foes into i(3 ci(adel: others of (he same genus undermine the 
skin of the ox, of the sheep, and in some countries, even of man 
himself. The grubs, by (heir action in their several stations, 
produce a purulent matter, which they imbibe, and which is 
stated by those who have studied them, to be beneficial to the 
animals they attack.*^ Another tribe of this Order, the jiesh- 
jiies,^ lay their eggs on dead bodies, and soon remove those 
nuisances, and the putrid and pestilential miasmata which they 
occasion, from the face of our globe This function is of such 
impor(ance to the welfare of our species, that some of these JiieSy 
in order that no time may be lost, are viviparous,* and bring 
forth their young in a state in which they can begin their work 
as soon as they are born. 

The aphidivorous Jiies^ have another function, in conjunction 
with the lace-winged jiies^^ lady-birds^'^ and some other insects, 
to reduce and keep within due limits the infinite myriads of 
the plant-licej^ which, in these climates, are the universal pests 
of the garden, the orchard, and the field. There are also flies^ 
(hat lay their eggs in the combs of humble-bees^ which, as it 
were, wear their livery, for the hairs that clothe their body are 
so disposed and coloured, as to imitate that of the bee, whose 
nests they frequent; so that, probably, they are often mistaken 

1 CEstrus, ^c. 

2 The species of gad-flies here alluded to are Gastrus Equi, and (Estrus 
Bovis, (E. Ovis and (E. Hominis. 

3 Sarchophaga. 4 Se-vivipara. 
5 Syrphus, ^c. 6 Hemerobius. 
7 Coccinella. 8 Aphides. 

9 VolucellUj S/-C. 

vv 



FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

for members of the family, and effect, (heir mischief unmo- 
lested. 

Another tribe of flies, called hornet-flies,'^ with some others 
related to them,^ like a hawk or other predaceous bird, seize 
then- prey with their legs, or their beak,^ but it can only be 
with the view of sucking its juices, as they have no masticat- 
ing organs. 

Dipterous insects, however, are not confined to animal food, 
whether living or putrescent, many also subsist upon a vegeta- 
ble diet. Mushrooms and other agarics sometimes swarm with 
the grubs of certain flies or gnats ;* others pass their first states 
in decaying timber; the narcissus and onion flies^ feast upon 
the bulbs from which they take their name ; and a little 
gnat,^ w^hen a grub, feeds upon the pollen of the flowers of the 
wheat. 

To these may be added those flies, that in their first state, 
may be regarded as purifiers of stagnant waters, and other 
offensive fluids or semi-fluids. The larves of the gnat or mos- 
quito are aquatic animals which may be seen either suspended 
at the surface, or sinking in most stagnant waters, compensate 
in some degree, for the torment of their blood-thirsty attacks, 
by discharging this function, and assisting to cleanse our stag- 
nant waters from principles that might otherwise generate in- 
fection. A variety of others contribute their efforts to bring 
about the same beneficial purpose. Almost all the Diptera, in 
their perfect state, even the blood-suckers, emulate the bees, 
in imbibing the nectar from the various flowers with which 
God has decorated the earth, and thus assist in keeping with- 
in due limits, the, otherwise suffocating, sweets that they ex- 
hale. 

From the statement here given, we see that the Creator 
has provided the members of this Order with a very diversified 
bill of fare, and that their efforts in their several states, and 
various departments, are of the first importance, as scavengers 
and depurators, to remove or mitigate nuisances, that would 
otherwise deform and tend to depopulate our globe. What 
they want in volume, is compensated for by numbers, for per- 
haps the individuals of no Order are so numerous. It is true, 
in particular periods, the locusts and aphides seem to outnum- 
ber them ; yet, ordinarily, the two-winged race, are those which 

1 ^silus. 2 Empis. 

3 Introd. to EiU. i. 274. 4 MycetophUa, i^c. 

5 Eristalis JVarcissi, and Scatophaga Ceparum. 

6 Cecidomyia Tritiri. 



mSECT CONDYLOPES. 363 

everywhere most force themselves upon our attention; during 
nearly three-fourths of the year we hear their hum, and see 
their motions, in our apartments, and even in the depth of 
winter, in sunny weather, by their myriads, dancing up and 
down under every hedge, they catch our attention in our 
walks. 

Order 10. — If we next turn our attention to the mandibulate 
Order, which stands most in contrast with the Diptera, the 
Hymenoptera immediately occurs to us, in which we find a 
variety of forms, which seem made to imitate those of flies, 
or vice versa. Thus there are flies^ that resemble saw-flies; 
others that simulate the ichneumoriidan parasites; others again 
that resemble wasps, bees, and humble-bees. 

Though the Insects belonging to this Order are included in 
the mandibulate Section ; for their mouth is furnished with 
mandibles and maxillae ; yet they do not generally use them to 
masticate their food, but for purposes usually connected with 
their sequence of instincts, as the bees in building their cells ;^ 
the wasps in scraping particles of wood from posts and rails for 
a similar purpose, and likewise to seize their prey ; but the 
great instrument by which, in their perfect state, they collect 
their food is their tongue, this, the bees particularly have the 
power of inflating, and can wipe with it both concave and con- 
vex surfaces ; and with it they, as it were, lick, but not suck, 
the honey from the blossoms, for, as Reaumur has proved, this 
organ acts as a tongue and not as o. pump.^ In the numerous 
tribes that compose this most interesting of the Orders, the 
tongue is lambent, and varies considerably in its structure, but 
in the great majority it is a flattish organ, often divided into 
several lobes. 

Some entomological writers have bestowed upon the mem- 
bers of the present Order the title of Principes, as if they were 
the princes of the Class of Insects, and if we consider the con- 
spicuous manifestation of the Divine attributes of Power, Wis- 
dom, and Goodness, exhibited in the wonderful instincts of 
those of them that are gregarious, we shall readily concede to 
them this title. If superior wisdom and devotedness to the 
general good are the best titles to rank and station ; the labo- 
rious and indefatigable ant, and the bee, celebrated from the 
earliest ages for its wonderful economy, its admirable struc- 
tures, and its useful products, are surely entitled to it, though 
they cannot vie with the insects of many of the other Orders 

1 jispistes, Meig. 2 See above, p. 288. 3 Mem. &c. v. 322. 



364 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

in size, and in the brilliancy and variety of their colours, and the 
pencil of the Creator has not decorated their wings with the 
diversified paintings which adorn those of the butterfly. 

The functions which are given in charge to the several 
members of this Order are various. Some, like the predaceous 
and carnivorous tribes of the Diptera, appear engaged in per- 
petual warfare with other insects; thus the wasps and hornets 
seize flies of every kind that come in their way, and will even 
attack the meat in the shambles ; the caterpillar-wasp^ walks 
off with caterpillars, the spider-wasp^ with spiders, and the fly- 
wasp^ with Jiies. But the motive that influences them, will 
furnish an excuse for their predatory habits. They do not 
commit these acts of violence to gratify their own thirst for 
blood, like many of the flies, but to furnish their young with 
food suited to their natures. The wasp carries the pieces of 
flesh she steals from the butcher to the young grubs in the cells 
of her paper mansion. The other wasps I mentioned each 
commit their eggs to the animal they are taught to select, and 
then bury it ; so that the young grub when hatched may revel 
in plenty.* 

Some of the Hymenoptera prefer a vegetable diet, and assist 
the Lepidoptera \n \he\v office. The caterpillars wliich infest 
many species of willow are hatched from the eggs of the saw- 
flies ;' one genus^ nearly related to them confines itself to 
timber, to which it is sometimes very destructive. 

Another tribe affect plants in a very remarkable manner. 
Their egg-placer, like a magician's wand, is gifted with the 
privilege, by a slight puncture in the twig or leaf of any shrub 
or tree, or the stalk of any plant, to cause the production of a 
wonderful and monstrous excrescence, sometimes resembling 
moss, as in the Bedeguar of the rose, at other times, a kind of 
apple, or a transparent berry, both of which seeming fruits, the 
oak, when touched by two of these little gall-flies of different 
species, produces as well as acorns : various other forms^ their 
galls assume, which need not be here mentioned. It is to be 
observed that the eggs of these gall-flies grow after they are 
laid, and perhaps these singular productions are more favoura- 
ble to their growth, being softer and more spongy and succu- 
lent than the twigs themselves would be. Even here Creative 
Power, Wisdom, and Goodness are conspicuously manifested, 

1 Ammophila. 2 Pompilus. 

3 Bembex. 4 See Jntrod. to Ent. i. 346. 

5 Cimbex, Tmthredo, Lijda, <^c. See Introd. to Ent. i. 255. 

6 Sirez. 7 Jntrod. to Ent. i. 4i6. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 365 

in providing sucli wonderful nests for these little germ-like 
Ggg^ ; these excrescences, indeed, instead of deforming the 
plants they are produced from, are often ornamental to them ; 
and besides this are also, some of them, of the highest utility 
to mankind — witness the Aleppo oak-gall,^ to which learning, 
commerce, the arts, and every individual who has a distant 
friend, are so deeply indebted. 

Another tribe is equally useful in a different department ; I 
allude to those Hymenoptera that are parasitic upon other In- 
sects, particularly upon the destructive hordes of caterpillars that 
are often so injurious both to the horticulturist and agriculturist. 
These insects are denominated by Latreille Pupivorous, not, as 
some may suppose, because they devour insects in their second, 
or pupe state, but from ihe classical meaning of the word, because 
they devour them before they are arrived at their perfect or 
adult state. This tribe may be considered as divided into two 
great bodies, one represented by the proper Ichneumons of 
Linne, which have, usually, veined wings, and the abdomen 
connected with the trunk by a footstalk ; the other forming the 
Minute Ichneumons of that great reviver of Natural History, 
distinguished, usually, by having wings with few or no veins 
on their disk, and by a sessile abdomen. These attack eggs 
and chrysalises, as well as caterpillars. Though the latter are 
the principal, yet they are not the only object of the great Ich- 
neumonidan host, for they attack insects of every order indis- 
criminately ; they seem, however, to annoy beetles, grasshop- 
pers, bugs, and froghoppers, less than others. They may, 
with great propriety, be called conservatives, since they keep 
those under that would otherwise destroy us.^ A little fly, 
before alluded to in these pages,^ which appears very destructive 
to wheat when in the ear, is rendered harmless, by the goodness 
of Providence, by not less than three of ihese httle benefactors 
of our race.* 

Connected with the subject of parasites is a singular history 
communicated to me by the Rev. F. W. Hope, one of the 
most eminent entomologists of the present day. In the month 
of August 1824, in the nest of a species of wasp,' he found 
more than fifty specimens of a singular little beetle, which may 
be called the wasp-beetle,^ long known to frequent wasps' nests. 
From their being found in cells which were closed by a kind 
of operculum, he conjectures that they lay their eggs in the 

I Cynips Scriptorum. 2 Introd. to Ent. i. 267. 

3 See above, p. 362. 4 Linn. Trans, v. 107. 

5 Vespa rufa. 6 Ripiphorus paradoxus. 



366 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

grub of the wasp, upon which they doubtless feed. Subse- 
quent to this, upon opening some of the cells, he was surprised 
to find, instead of the beetles, several specimens of an Ichneu- 
mon belonging to Jurine's genus, Anomalon^ Upon another 
examination, some days after this, no more of these last in- 
sects appearing, he discovered that they had been pierced, in 
their chrysalis state, by a minute species belonging to the family 
of ChalcididanSf of which he found no less than twenty speci- 
mens flying about in search of their prey. 

" From the above facts," Mr Hope remarks, " we have a 
convincing proof, if such were wanted, of a Superintending 
Power which ordains checks and counterchecks to remedy the 
superfecundity of the insect world." First the wasp, a great 
destroyer of flies and various other insects, and often a trouble- 
some pest and annoyance to man himself, is prevented from 
becoming too numerous, amongst other means, by the wasp- 
beetle ; then, lest it should reduce their numbers so as to inter- 
fere with their efficiency, this last is kept in check by the Ano- 
malon, which, in its turn, that it may obey the law. Thus far 
shall thou come, and no further, becomes the prey of another de- 
vourer. Mr Hope observed, and the fact is curious, that the 
specimens of the wasp-beetle obtained from the female wasps 
were about one third larger than the others. 

But of all the Hymenopterous, or indeed any other Insects, 
there are none, as I before observed, that illustrate the pri- 
mary attributes of the Deity more strikingly than those that 
are gregarious, which build for the members of their societies 
spacious colleges, if I may so call them, capable often of con- 
taining many thousand inhabitants, and remarkable for the 
pains they bestow upon the nurture and education of their 
young. There are three great tribes in the present Order, 
distinguished by this instinct, — the loasps and hornets, the bees 
and humble-bees, and the ants. 

The wasps and hornets are remarkable for the curious papier- 
mache edifices, in the construction of which they employ fila- 
ments of wood, — scraped from posts and rails with their own 
jaws, — mixed with saliva, of which the hexagonal cells, in 
which they rear their young, are formed, and often their combs 
are separated and supported by pillars of the same material ; 
and the external walls of their nests are formed by foliaceous 
layers of their ligneous paper. ^ Latreille mentions a Brazilian 
species that makes an abundant provision of honey. 

1 Latrelle is of opinion tliat this is not a natural genus. JV. D. D'H. j\. 
W. 128. 

2 ^Qe Introd.to Em.i.bQl. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 367 

In the book of Joshua we are informed* that God, by means 
of some animal' of this genus, drove out the two kings of the 
Amorites from before the Children of Israel. In the second 
volume of Lieut. Holman's Travels — in whom the loss of sight 
has been compensated by a wonderful acuteness of mental vi- 
sion—the following anecdote is related illustrative of this fact.^ 

"Eight miles from Grandie , the muleteers sud- 
denly called out * Marambundas, Marambundas !' which indi- 
cated the approach of a host of wasps. In a moment all the 
animals, whether loaded or otherwise, laid down on their 
backs, kicking most violently ; while the blacks, and all per- 
sons not already attacked, ran away in different directions, all 
being careful, by a wide sweep, to avoid the swarms of tor- 
mentors that come forward like a cloud. I never witnessed a 
panic so sudden and complete, and really believe that the 
bursting of a water-spout could hardly have produced more 
commotion. However it must be confessed that the alarm was 
not without a good reason, for so severe is the torture inflicted 
by these pigmy assailants, that the bravest travellers are not 
ashamed to fly the instant they perceive the terrific host 
approaching, which is of no uncommon occurrence on the 
Campos." 

I shall now turn to those admirable creatures, which though, 
as a wise man observes, they are little among such as jiy, their 
fruit is the chief of sweet thingSy^ those Heaven-instructed mathe- 
maticians, who before any geometer could calculate under 
what form a cell would occupy the least space without dimin- 
ishing its capacity, and before any chemist existed to discover 
how wax might be elaborated from vegetable sweets, instructed 
by the Fountain of Wisdom, had built their hexagonal cells of 
that pure material, had closed them at the bottom with three 
rhomboidal pieces, and were enabled, without study, so to con- 
struct the opposite story of combs, that each of these rhomboids 
should form one of those of three opposed cells,* thus giving 
strength to the structure that, in no other place, could have 
been given to it. Wise in their government, diligent and ac- 
tive in their employments, devoted to their young and to their 
queen, they read a lecture to mankind that exemplifies their 
Oriental name — she that speakeih. Whoever examines their 
external structure, as has been before observed,^ will find every 
part adapted to their various employments. 

1 xxiv. 12. 2 Quoted in Lit. Gazette, Jan. 3, 1835, p. 4. 

3 Ecclus. xi. 3. 4 Plate XL Fig. 3. 

5 See above, p. 288, and Introd. to Ent. i. 481—497, and ii. Lett. xix. xx. 



368 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

These valued animals, so worthy of the attention of the sage, 
as well as the culture of the economist, are ahnost the only 
ones of the Order that are guilty of no spoliation, and injure 
no one: they take what impoverishes none, while it eniiches 
them and us also, by the valuable products which are derived 
from their skill and labour — true emblems of honest industry. 

1 shall merely mention the humble-bee,^ and their subteria- 
nean habitations, which are of a much ruder architecture than 
those of the hive-bee: the cells, however, are made of a coarse 
kind of wax, but placed very confusedly, not exhibiting the 
geometrical precision observable in the latter.^ 

I may here observe that all insects of this Order, in their 
perfect state, imbibe the nectar from the flowers, but none, the 
hive and humble-bees and one species of wasp excepted, with 
the view of storing it up for future use. 

The last Hymenopterous tribe^ includes the ants, and is 
almost equally interesting with the preceding one, for the won- 
derful industry of the animals just mentioned. They are uni- 
versal collectors ; every thing that comes in their way, whether 
animal or vegetable, living or dead, answers their purpose ; and 
the paths to their nests are always darkened with the busy 
crowds that are moving to and fro. Their great function seems 
to be to remove every thing that appears to be out of its place, 
and cannot go about its own business. I have seen several of 
them dragging a half-dead snake, about the size of a goose- 
quill. They do not, however, like the bees, usually store up 
provisions, but they will imbibe sweet juices from fruits and 
also from the plant-lice, which may be called their cows.* 
However, almost all their cares and labour are connected with 
the nurture and sustenance of their young. 

I am indebted to the kindness of Lieutenant-Colonel Sykes, 
of the Bombay army — well known for the zeal and ability 
with which he investigated the animal productions of the west- 
ern provinces of India — for some interesting observations upon 
three species of ants, particularly one, which, from making 
its nests on the branches of trees, is called the Tree-ant, singu- 
larly exemplifying the extraordinary instincts of these labo- 
rious and provident insects, and which I have his permission to 
insert in this work. 

The Tree-ant'^ inhabits the Western Ghauts, in the coUecto- 
rate of Poona, in the Deccan, at an elevation of from 2,000 to 



1 Ibid. Lett, xviii. 2 See Linn. Trans, vi. t. xxvii. 

3 Hetcrogyna. Lair. See Introd. to Ent. i. 476 — 481. ii. Lett. xvii. 

4 Ibid. ii. 87—01. 5 Myrmicn Kirhii. Sj^kes. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 369 

4,000 feet from the level of the sea. It is of a ferruginous 
colour, two-tenths of an inch in length ; head of the neuter 
disproportionably large ;^ the thorax is armed posteriorly with 
two siiarp spines! When moving the insect turns the abdo- 
men back over the thorax,'' and the knotty pedicle lies in a 
groove between the spines. The male is without the spines.^ 

These ants are remarkable for forming their nests,* called by 
the Marattas moongeeara, on the boughs of trees of different 
kinds; and their construction is singular, both for the material 
and the architecture, and is indicative of admirable foresight 
and contrivance : in shape they vary from globular to oblong, 
the longest diameter being about ten inches, and the shortest 
eight. The nests consist of a multitude of thin leaves of cow- 
dung, imbricated like tiles upon a house, the upper leaf formed 
of one unbroken sheet, covering the summit like a skull-cap. 
The leaves are placed one upon another, in a wavy or scallop- 
ed manner, so that numerous little arched entrances are left, 
and yet the interior is perfectly secured from rain. They are 
usually attached near the extremity of a branch, and some of 
the twigs pass through the nest. A vertical seciion presents a 
number of irregular cells, formed by the same process as the 
exterior. Towards the interior the cells are more capacious 
than those removed from the centre, and an occasional dried 
leaf is taken advantage of to assist in their formation. The 
nurseries for the young broods in different stages of develop- 
ment are in different parts of the nest. The cells nearest the 
centre are filled with very minute eggs, the youngest members 
of the community; those more distant, with larger eggs,^ mix- 
ed with larves ; and the most remote, with pupes near disclo- 
sure. In fact, in these last cells only were found winged in- 
sects. The female is in a large or royal cell, near the centre 
of the nest : she is about half an inch long, of the thickness of 
a crow-quill, white, and the abdomen has five or six brown 
ligatures round it, like the female of the white ants; the head 
is very small, and the legs mere rudiments : she is kept a close 
prisoner, and incapable of motion in her cell, a circumstance in 
which these appear to approach the white ants, and which in- 
dicates that they should form a distinct genus. 

There was no store of provisions in the nests; they were 
indebted therefore for their support to daily labour. We may 
gain some idea of their perseverance when we consider that 



1 


Plate XI. c. Fig. 1,3 


2 Plate XI. Fig. 3. 


3 


im. Fig. 2. 


4 Ibid. Fig. 4. 


5 


It should seem from this that the eggs grow. 
WW 





370 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

the material of which the nest is formed — cow-dung — ^must 
have been sought for on the earth, and probably carried from a 
considerable distance up the trees. 

Colonel Sykes related to me another anecdote with regard 
to an Indian species of ant, which lie calls the large black ant, 
instancing, in a wonderful manner, their perseverance in at- 
taining a favourite object, which was witnessed by himself, his 
lady, and his whole household. When resident at Poona, the 
dessert, consisting of fruits, cakes, and various preserves, always 
remained upon a small side-table, in a verandah of the dining- 
room. To guard against inroads the legs of the table were 
immersed in four basins filled with water ; it was removed an 
inch from the wall, and, to keep off dust through open w^indows, 
was covered with a table-cloth. At first the ants did not at- 
tempt to cross the water, but as the strait was very narrow, 
from an inch to an inch and a half, and the sweets very tempt- 
ing, they appear at length to have braved all risks, to have 
committed themselves to the deep, to have scrambled across 
the channel, and to have reached the object of their desires, 
for hundreds we found every morning revelling in enjoyment : 
daily vengeance was executed upon them without lessening 
their numbers; at last the legs of the table were painted, just 
above the water, with a circle of turpentine. This at first 
seemed to prove an effectual barrier, and for some days the 
sweets were unmolested, after which they w^ere again attack- 
ed by these resolute plunderers; but how they got at them 
seemed totally unaccountable, till Col. Sykes, who often passed 
the table, was surprised to see an ant drop from the wall, about 
a foot above the table, upon the cloth that covered it; another 
and another succeeded. So that though the turpentine and 
the distance from the wall appeared effectual barriers, still the 
resources of the animal, when determined to carry its point, 
were not exhausted, and by ascending the wall to a certain 
height, with a slight effort against it, in falling it managed to 
land in safety upon the table. Col. Sykes asks, — is tliis in- 
stinct? I should answer, no: the animal's appetite is greatly 
excited, its scent probably informs it where it must seek the 
object of its desire ; it first attempts the nearest road; when 
this is barricaded it naturally ascends the walls near which 
the table was placed, and so succeeds by casting itself dowii, — 
all the while under the guidance of its senses/ 

It is observed, in the Introduction to Entomology, that though 
ants, "during the cold winters, in this couniry, remain in a 

3 See above, p. 31S, 33C, and hitntrl. to Evt. ii. fi'i. 



INSECT COWDYLOPES. 371 

State of torpidity, and have no need of food, yet in warmer re- 
gions, during the rainy seasons, when they are probably con- 
lined to their nests, a store of provisions may be necessary for 
them.^ Now, though the rainy season, at least in America, 
as lias been staled on a former occasion,^ is a season in which 
insects are full of life, yet the observation, that ants may store 
up provisions in warm countries, is confirmed by an account 
sent me by Col. Sykes, with respect to another species which 
appears to belong to the same genus as the celebrated ant of 
visitation,* by which the houses of the inhabitants of Surinam 
were said to be cleared periodically of their cock-roaches, mice, 
and even rats.* The present species has been named by Mr 
Hope, the provident ant.^ These ants, after long continued 
rains dining the monsoon, were found to brmg up and lay on 
the surface of the earth, on a fine day, its stores of grass seeds, 
and grains of Guinea corn, for the purpose of drying them. 
Many scores of these hoards were frequently observable on the 
extensive Parade at Poona. Tliis account clearly proves that, 
where the climate and their circumstances require it, these in- 
dustrious creatures do store up provisions. 

From these very interesting communications we may re- 
mark how the functions of animals are varied, the same func- 
tion being often given in charge to tribes perfectly different in 
different climates. In temperate regions, the principal agents 
in disinfecting the air by devouring or removing excrement, 
belong to the Order of beetles^ but in India, where probably 
more hands are wanted to effect this purpose of Providence, 
the tree-ants are called in to aid the beetles, by building their 
nests of this fetid mortar, and thus clear the surface of innumer- 
able nuisances, which probably soon dry and become scentless. 
In Europe, again, no ants are found to verify Solomon's obser- 
vation, literally interpreted, but in India we see, and probably 
it may also be the case in Palestine, provision for the future 
is not stored up solely by the bees, but the ants, where it is 
necessary, are gifted with the same admirable instinct. 

A circumstance here requires notice, which is almost pecu- 
liar to the gregarious Hymenoptera dwelling in a common ha- 
bitation; in all their communities, besides one or more prolific 
females and males, there is an order of sterile females, which 
have no connexion with the other sex, and are solely employed 
in labours and pursuits beneficial to the community at large 

1 See above, p. 315, 336, and Introd. to Ent, ii, 46 

2 See above, p. 321. 3> Mta cephalotes. 
4 De Getr. iii. 607. 5 A. providtns. 



372 FUI^CTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

to which they belong, especially the care and nurture of the 
young. 

The wisdom and beneficial effects of this law, by which the 
Creator has regulated their comraunities, and prescribed to all 
their duties and functions, must be evident to every one. It 
sets free the majority of the community to give their whole 
attention to those labours upon which the welfare and existence 
of their several associations depend. Indeed, if they were all 
to be prolific, their societies would soon be dissolved, or de- 
stroyed by the evils attendant upon an overabundant popula- 
tion; or their increase would be so rapid, that the whole earth 
would soon be covered by them, to the great annoyance, if not 
destruction, of the rest of its inhabitants. 

Now I am upon this subject, I may add a few remarks upon 
the kindred societies of whiie-ants, which, though they belong 
to a different Order, are, in many respects, analogous to those 
of the true ants; and the differences observable between them 
arise from a marked diversity in the nature of their meta- 
morphosis; namely, that in the last named insects, boih larves 
and pupes are incapable of locomotion, and all the labours 
of the society, as well as its defence and the care and nurture 
of the young, are devolved upon a description of its mem- 
bers that are not gifted with the faculty of reproduction: 
whereas, in the former, the white ants, the larves and pupes, 
in conformity to the law which, in this respect, regulates the 
Class to which they belong, are locomotive and more active in 
those states than in the last or reproductive one, and are there- 
fore fully qualified to act in all the working departments, and 
to transact the general business of the society ; but as this, 
in their case, required a conformation of the head and oral or- 
gans inconsistent with their use as offensive w^eapons, another 
order was necessary to act as sentinels, and to be entrusted 
with the defence of the nest or termitary, as it is called, and 
its inhabitants. That such an order exists, w^e learn from the 
statements of Smeathman and Latreille, who, both of them, 
had means of personal investigation, and the latter of whom 
brought to the investigation the deepest insight into his sub- 
ject, and the most extensive knowledge of insects and their 
history possessed by any man in Europe. Upon the accuracy 
of his statements, therefore, the most entire reliance may be 
placed. The species* he investigated was discovered by him- 
self, in the neighbourhood of Bordeaux, inhabiting the trunks 
of firs and oaks, immediately under the bark, where, without 

1 Termcs lucijuga. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 373 

attacking (he bark itself, they fonuecl a great number of holes 
and irregular galleries. In these societies he discovered, at all 
times, two kinds of individuals, which were without wings, 
elongated, soft, of a yellowish white, with their head, trunk, 
ai]d abdomen distinct; they were active, furnished with six 
legs, their head large, and the eyes very small, or altogether 
wanting; but, in one of these kinds of individuals, whicli com- 
pose the bulk of the society, the head is rounded and the man- 
dibles not extended ; while in the others, which form not more 
than one twenty-fifth of the population, the head is much 
larger, elongated, and cylindrical, and terminated by mandibles 
that extend from it and cross each other ; these Latreille always 
found stationed at the entrance of the cavities where the others 
were assembled in greatest numbers : towards the end of the 
winter and in the spring, he discovered individuals exactly re- 
sembling those first mentioned, but having the rudiments of 
four wings, and in June, the sanie individuals had acquired 
four ample wings, had become of a blackish colour, and con- 
sisted of males and females ; a month later a few only w^ere 
found in the termitary, which had lost their wings, and eggs 
now begun to apppear laid up in certain labyrinths of the 
wood.* 

It is clear from this account that those with a round head 
and short mandibles are larves, w^hich go through the usual 
metamorphosis of their tribe, not changing their form, but ac- 
quiring wings, first packed up in cases, and afterwards devel- 
oped. The second description, with the elongated head and 
crossed mandibles, never acquired wnngs, and therefore corres- 
pond precisely w4th the neuters amongst ants, only as Provi- 
dence always economizes means, and wills that nothing be 
lost or wasted, he has decreed that these locomotive larves and 
pupes should not live in idleness. 

Order 7. — We now come to an Order, taking their food by 
suction, which appear to have been formed to deck our fields 
and groves with various beauty ; but which in their first state, 
when they masticate their food, they mar and destroy, oftert 
stripping the trees of their leaves, and covering our hedges 
with their webs full of crawling myriads of devastators. It 
will be seen that I am speaking of the Lepidopterous Order, 
consisting of three great phalanxes, the diurnal fliers, or but- 
terflies,^ the crepuscular fliers, or hawkmoths/ the nocturnal 

1 Latreille in JV. D. D'H. JV. xxxiii. 90. 

2 Papilio. L. 3 Sphinx. L. 



374 ruNCTioNs and instincts. 

fliers, or moths,* each divided into several genera. Their 
caterpillars most generally feed upon the foliage of vegetahles 
of every description ; but those of some of the lower tribes'* of 
moths devour animal substance, such as wool, fur, leather, 
grease, and the like; some even enter the bee-hive and devour 
the combs, others the cabinet of the entomologist to prey upon 
his insects, others even attack the books of the scholar. Their 
office seems to be to keep in check too luxuriant vegetation, 
and, in many of (he latter instances, ihe removing of dead ani- 
mal matter, and every thing putrescent from the surface of 
the globe. 

But this is not the whole, they likewise help to maintain, as 
has been before observed,^ half the birds of the air, foiming a 
principal portion of their food ; and in some countries, as well 
as the locusts and white ants,* they are eagerly devoured by 
man himself. There is a certain mountain, in New Holland, 
as we are informed by Mr Bennett,^ called Bugong mountain, 
from multitudes of small moths, called Bugong by the natives, 
which congregate at certain times, upon masses of granite, on 
this mountain. The months of November, December, and 
January, are quite a season of festivity amongst these people, 
who assemble from every quarter to collect these moths. They 
are stated also to form the principal summer food of those who 
inhabit to the south of the snow mountains. To collect these 
moths, or rather butterflies,^ the natives make smothered fires 
under the rocks on which they congregate ; and suffocating 
them with smoke, collect them by bushels, and then bake 
them by placing them on heated ground. Thus they separate 
from them the down and the wings, they are then pounded 
and formed into cakes resembling lumps of fat, and often 
smoked, which preserves them for some time. When accus- 
tomed to this diet they thrive and fatten exceedingly upon it.'' 
Millions of these animals were observed also, on the coast of 
New Holland, both by Captains Cook and King.^ Thus has a 
kind Providence provided an abundant supply of food for a race 
that, subsisting solely by hunting or fishing, must often be re- 
duced to great straits. 

Orders S and 11. — The masticating tribe, which present the 
most striking analogy to the scaly-winged lepidopterous insects, 

1 Pkalajia. L. 2 Tincida:. 

3 See above, p. 202. 4 Introd. to EtU. I 303, 307. 

5 Wanderings, &c. i. 265. 6 Euplaa hamaia. M'L. 

7 Bennett, uhi supr. 271. 8 Ibid. 209, note *. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 375 

is one of very diflferent. habits ; mostly bold, rapacious, and 
sanguinary, they are perpetually chasing other insects, and 
devouring them, and this they do, not in one, but in all their 
stales. 1 am speaking here of the Neuropterous Order, espe- 
cially the dragon flies, those insects of vigorous wing and 
indomitable force. Every one who compares these with the 
Heliconian butterflies, the wings of which are sometimes, more 
or less, denuded of their scales,* will perceive that they are 
analogues of each other ; and one of this Order, ihe *RscalaphuSy 
resembles a butterfly so strikingly, both by its wings and an- 
tennae, that it has been described as one by a very eminent 
entomologist.^ The Ant-lions, and lace-winged flies, in the 
port of their wings, resemble several moths ; and the Trichoptera, 
an osculant Order, but still reckoned amongst the J^europtera 
by Latreille, in its habit of clothing itself with a case made of 
various articles, imitate the clothes-moth, and others of that 
tribe, which invest themselves with cases made of wool, fur, 
and similar materials. 

The dragon-flies in their two first states, by means of their 
^vonderful mask,^ destroy a vast number of aquatic insects, and 
in their last an equal number in the air. 

The white-ants,* and some kindred insects, like the ants de- 
vour every thing but metal, that is exposed to their attacks, 
particularly timber. A deserted African village is soon re- 
moved by them, working under their covered ways; and, in 
tropical regions, a forest quickly springs up w4iere a busy popu- 
lation ran to and fro a few years before. So that they are 
amongst the instruments in the hand of Providence, that the 
places deserted by man shall be restored again to the vegetable 
and animal races that were in possession before he cleared it for 
his own habitation. The white ants seem to connect this 
Order with the Hymenoptera by means of the common ants; 
which, however, as Colonel Sykes informs me, bear the most 
rooted enmity to them, and destroy them without mercy. In 
digging up some white ants' nests, in his garden at Poona, he 
once found two queens in one cell, a remarkable anomaly in 
their history. In the course of the present year I received a 
letter signed P. T. Baddeley, inclosing a drawing and speci- 
mens, of a singular species of white ant, with a head precisely 
resembling that of an elephant, except that there was no 
xepresentalion of the tusks. The head, which is enormously 

1 E. G. Heliconius Quirina, Hippodamia, &c. 

2 Scopoli, JV. D. D'H. JV. ii. 580. 

3 IrUrod. to Ent. iii. 12,5. 4 Termer. 



376 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

large compared wilh (he size of the animal, terminates in a 
long proboscis. Mr Baddeley found it in great numbers about 
two years ago, under some teak timber; the only circumstance 
which he mentions of its habits. 

Orders 8 and 9. — There are two Orders taking their food by 
suction, the Homoptera and Ilemiptera^ which perhaps should 
rather be regarded as Sub-orders, as Latreille considers them, 
and which were included by Linne in the same order wilh the 
Orthoptera of modern entomologists, to which, in fact, iheyare 
contrasted more or less. I shall therefore consider them to- 
gether. 

The Homoptera are herbivorous, sucking the sap of trees 
and plants,* and the principal tribe of them was celebrated of 
old, both by Grecian and Roman bards, under the names of 
Tettix and Cicada, for the far-resounding song of its males. 

This order contains some of the most singular rnonstrosities 
that the insect world produces; animals armed with strange 
appendages and horns, which in the majority, are processes of 
the trunk; but, in the lanthorn-Jiies, of the head: the latter 
have been regarded, as their name imports, as a kind of Ian- 
thorn, given to the animal to aflbrd it light; but considerable 
doubt has been thrown upon the fact. The use of the arms 
and processes of the trunk, which are found chiefly in the 
male, as well as in many male Lamellicorn beetles,'' has not 
been satisfactorily ascertained; but probably, like the horns of 
quadrupeds, and the spurs of male gallinaceous birds, they use 
them in their mutual battles. 

One of these animals, as producing the manna of the Phar- 
macopeia, may be regarded as of some use to mankind. And 
perhaps, in general, the tribe, in their perfect state, in which 
they imbibe the juice of plants and trees, if not too numerous, 
are probably of use to trees that are over vigorous, and full of 
sap. In their grub state, in America, they are very injurious 
to timber, and fruit trees, into which they introduce their eggs 
by a remarkable organ or ovipositor. 

The proper Hemiptera, so called because their wing-covers 
at the base are of a substance resembling horn or leather, and 
are membranous at the tip, form [he last suctorious Order; 
they are carnivorous, or more properly, animal-suckers;^ for 
though many of them are found on particular trees and plants, 
it is not the juices of these that they usually imbibe, but those 

1 Phytomyzii, plant-suckers. 

Ji Dynastes, OjilhophagHs, Copris, A-c. 3 Zoomyza. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 377 

of the insects that frequent them ; there is one, however, too 
well known in this country, the bed-bug,^ which is more am- 
bitious, extending its attacks, hke the tiea, to the liiglier ani- 
mals, being often found upon pigeons, upon rabbits, and more 
commonly infesting man himself, duiing his hours of repose. 
This Sub-order also presents a great variety of forms, and the 
bite of some is very venomous. 

The functions of these are similar to those of other Insects, 
that derive their nutriment from the higher animals by sucking 
the blood or juices; but the bugs, being generally Insect-suck- 
ers, with their juices also suck away tjieir lives, and so are 
employed to diminish iheir numbers. The water-bugs^ liUai-k 
other aquatic animals as well as Insects, such as fishes, Mol- 
luscans, &c. 

Order 12. — The Orders that are placed as parallels to the 
Homoptera and Hernipterai are the Orthoptera and Coleoptera. 
The former includes within its limits Insects of various habits, 
which may be divided, respect being had to their food, into 
three tribes: — those that are herbivorous, those that aie carnivo- 
rous, and those that are omnivorous. 

The first of these tribes includes all those Insects known by 
the common name of grasshoppers, and locusts f several of those 
whose wing-covers and wings resemble leaves or flowers;* be- 
sides other kinds, which I need not mention. The ravages of 
those first mentioned, especially the locusts, are so well known,^ 
that I shall not enlarge upon them. 

The second tribe consists of what, from the posture they as- 
sume, have been called praying-insects,^ some of which also re- 
semble leaves. These are as ferocious and cruel as any of the 
insect tribes.^ 

The last tribe consists principally of the mc/cefs^ and cock- 
roaches,^ animals that make their appearance only in the nighty 
and feed both on animal and vegetable substances. It has 
been suggested to me by an eminent and learned Prelate, that 
the Egyptian plague of flies, which is usually supposed to have 
been either a mixture of different species, or a fly then called 
the dog-fly,^^ but which is not now known, was a cock-roach. 
His Lordship did not assign the reason that led him to adopt 



1 


Cimex lectvlarius. 


2 


Hydrometra, JVotoneeta, JVepa, &c 


3 


Loctista. 


4 


Pterophylla. Stoll. Saut t. i. 3. 


5 


See above, p. 48. 


6 


Mantis. Phyllium. 


7 


Introd. to Ent. i. 278. 


8 


Gryllus. Grytlotalpa, &c. 


9 


Blatta. 
XX 


10 


Gr. Kv^o/uvtai.. 



S78 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

this opinion, but the Hebrew nanae of the animal, which is the 
same by which the raven also is distinguished, furnishes no 
slight argument in favour of it. The same word also signifies 
the evening. Now ihe cock-roach at this lime found in Egypt^ 
is black, with the anterior margin of the thorax white, and 
tiiey never emerge frum their iiiding places till the evenings 
both of which circumstances would furnish a reason to tlie 
name given it; and it might be called the evening Insect, both 
from its colour and the time of its appearance. 

There appears to be a striking analogical resemblance be- 
tween rhe bulk of the Orthoptera and Homoptera to the Reptilesy 
particularly the Balrachian ; their leaping and song are the 
principal points in which they agree, whence the members of 
the latter Sub-order have usually been called /rog-hoppers, but 
in some of the grass-hopper tribe there is also a singular coinci- 
dence in their form.^ 

Order 4. — The earwigs^ form a truly osculant Order, between 
the Orthoptera and Coleoptera, and partaking of the characters 
of both, but their habits are so well known that it is not neces- 
sary to dwell upon them. 

Order 13. — Of all the insect Orders which God has created 
and employed to work his will upon earth, by removing what- 
ever deforms or defiles the face of nature, there is none more 
remarkable, both for its numbers, the diversities of form and 
aspect that it exhibits, and of armour both defensive and of- 
fensive, and also of its organs of various kinds, and for various 
uses, than that of which I am now, in the last place, to give 
some account, the beetles, namely, forming the Order Coleoplera. 

The parallel to this Order amongst the suctorious insects, 
appears to be the /femzpfera Sub-order, the wing-covers of some 
of which, ^ having scarcely any membrane at their extremity, 
represent the elytra of the Order in question ; indeed the sub- 
stance of the base of these organs, in the generality, also cor- 
responds with that of the beetles. 

Of all the mandibulate Orders there is none that appears to 
have so universal an action upon every substance, both vege- 
table and animal, both living and dead, as the one before us, but 
it is difficult to class them according to their food without 
breaking up natural groups; thus in the great tribe of Laniel- 
licorn beetles, forming Linue's genus Scarabccus, we find in- 

1 Stoll. 6aw«. «. viii.b./. 29. 2 Forficula. 

3 LygcEUS apteruSf brevipennis, &c. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 379 

sects that feed upon a great variety of vegetable food, both 
liquid and solid ; green and putrescent; the feces of animals ; 
and in a few instances, on their flesh. 

A very considerable number of this Order are predaceoiis in 
their habits, and devour without pity, any small animal they 
can seize and overpower. Of this discription is the whole 
tribe of ground-beetles, called by old writers clocks and dors, 
considered by Linne as forming one genus,* but now divided 
into more than a hundred. 

One of the most remarkable of this tribe is the spectre-bee- 
tle'^ described by Hagenbach, which is found both in Java and 
China. In its general aspect, though evidently belonging to 
the Carabidans, it seems to represent the praying-insects, and 
the spectres f and, from its great flatness, it probably insinuates 
itself into close places, either for concealment or to lie in wait 
for its prey. 

The splendid tribe of tiger-beetles,'*' as they indicate by their 
fearful jaws, have the same habits, adding a swift flight to the 
rapid motions on foot which distinguish the other. The grubs 
of these emulate spiders in some respects, lying in wait for their 
prey in burrows in which they curiolisly suspend themselves.^ 
In the waters a considerable tribe of Beetles pursue various 
aquatic insects, and by means of their oary hind legs swim 
very swiftly, often suspending themselves at the surface by 
their anal extremity, near which are two large spiracles for 
respiration, for they do not respire the water like fishes and the 
grubs of Dragon-tiies. Their larves are armed with tremen- 
dous sickle-shaped jaws, through which they pump the juices 
from fishes as well as insects. 

Besides those that are indiscriminate devourers, others con- 
fine themselves to particular tribes or species. Thus one of 
the most splendid of the, so called, ground-beetles, named the 
sycophant," ascends the trees and shrubs after the caterpillars 
which are its destined food, and probably other species of the 
genus have the same commission. The rove-beetles'^ bury them- 
selves in excrement in order to devour the grubs that frequent 
it. I have before mentioned^ the wasp-beetle ; there are others 
which, in the same way, attack those of the hive and other 
bees.^ Another has a more remarkable instinct, by which it 



1 Carahus. 2 Mormolyce. Plate XI. Fig. 1. 

3 Phasma. 4 Cicindela, Manticora. 

5 Introd. to. Ent. iii. 152. 6 Calosoma Sycophanta. 

7 Slaphylinus. L. 8 See above, p. 366. 

9 Clerus apiarius, and alvearius. 



380 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

is impelled to seek its nutriment in the slimy snail. ^ There is 
an insect much resembling a bird-louse that is parasitic on 
wild-bees, which has been thought to be produced from the 
eggs of tiie great oil-beetle,^ but some doubt still hangs on the 
fact.3 

Anoiher tribe of beetles hnve a dififerent commission from 
their Creator, and irisiendof //"zjmg'ones, feed upon f/ea(/ animals, 
of evei}^ description. To this tribe belong the burying beetles, 
long celebiated for the manner in wiiich they bury pieces of 
flesh to which they have committed an egg ;* other carrion 
beetles^ may be fpund in considerable numbers of various spe- 
cies and kinds, under every carcass f even boneSy after they are 
denuded of the flesh, are attended by certain insects of this 
Order, by whose efforts they are completely stripped of every 
remnant of muscle.'' Some even find their nutriment in the 
interior of horns. « 

Lacordaire observes that the carcasses dry so rapidly in South 
America, that few necrophagous insects are found there : and 
that even in the Pampas, and at Buenos Ayres, where animals 
decompose as in Europe, there are but few of these insects : but 
their place is supplied by innumerable birds of prey. As soon 
as an animal is killed, they fly in crowds from every part of 
the horizon, though one before was not to be seen. The most 
destructive beetles in these countries are those that attack 
leather or skins. Two species of the same genus^ commit 
dreadful ravages in the magazines of this article : and in spite 
of the constant pains that are bestowed to get rid of these in- 
sects and their grubs, great losses are suflfered. 

Another unsightly substance is removed by numberless 
beetles, whose office is that of scavengers ; the celebrated Sea- 
rabceus of the Egyptians,^" the symbol, as it is supposed, of the 
sun, is of this description ; the pill-beetle also,*^ equal in fame 
to the burying one, for trundling its pills, each containing an 
egg, with the aid of his co-species : many of a smaller type are 
likewise devoted to the same ofliice." 

It is worthy of remark that all these feed only on the excre- 
ment of herbivorous animals ; none having been recorded, I 

1 Cochleoctonus. 2 Mcloc. 

3 See Introd. to Ent. iii. 162. note 6. 4 Introd. to Ent. t. 352. 

5 SUpha. L. 6 Dcrmestes. Byrrhns, &c. 

7 Mtldula, &.C. * 8 Trox. 

9 Dcrmestes cadavcrinus et vulpinus. 10 Scarahdus sneer . 

11 Mteuchus pilularius. Jntrod. to Ent. i. 351. 

12 Spharidium, &c. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 



S8t 



believe, that feed on that of carnivorous ones, except a single 
species^ that inhabits human excrement solely, but forms no 
burrow under it. 

Others of the order make a transition to the vegetable king- 
dom, by attacking various kinds of fungi, as agarics, Boleti, 
puff-balls, and the like, which in fact seem to exhibit, in their 
substance, some analogy to flesh. Fabricius has given the 
name of Agaric-eaier^ to a genus that is chiefly found in the 
Boletus ; another beetle, however, devours agarics, and is found, 
I believe, in no other fimgus ;" and the puff-ball affords a 
favourite nutriment to others.* 

Some beetles, or tribes of beetles, are both predaceous, car- 
nivorous, coprophagous, and fungivorous. The Histers will 
devour carrion, dung, funguses, and putrescent wood : I once 
found the autumnal dung-beetle^ in considerable numbers in a 
dead bird, and Lacordaire mentions others that are carnivorous: 
he says that the habits of Trox approach those of the necro- 
phagous beetles, it being always found under half-dried car- 
casses, of which they gnaw the tendinous parts. It is foimd 
also in the excrements of man and herbivorous animals. Pha- 
nceus Milon he observed principally under putrescent fishes on 
the shores of the River Plate.^ 

We have thus had a regular transition, with regard to their 
food, leading the beetle tribes through the animal to the vege- 
table world. 

Vegetable feeders are innumerable amongst them, the gold,^ 
tortoise,* and flea-beetles^ all devour plants in both their active 
states, and some of these are extremely injurious to the farmer^" 
and gardener. Many are destructive to seeds, fruits, and roois, 
numbers of the weevil tribe, and all the Bruchi are of this 
description.^^ 

But of all the beetle tribes the timber-devourers are the most 
numerous; one of the most splendid and brilliant of the whole 
Order, the Buprestidans, belongs to this department, and the 
still more numerous and more varied Capricorn beetles,**^ though 
less refulgent with metallic splendour, add a vast momentum 
in the interminable forests of tropical regions, and must be of 
the greatest use in gradually reducing trees that have been 

1 Hyhosorus geminatus. 2 Mycetophagus, Boletaria. Marsh. 

3 Oztjporus maxillosus. 4 Lycoperdina. 

5 Geotrupes autumnalis. 6 ^nn. des Sc. Nat. xx. 263. 265 . 

7 Chrysomela, &c. 8 Cassida. 

9 Haltica. 10 Jntrod. to Ent. i. 187. 207. 

11 Jhid, 172. 176, &c. 12 Ceramhyx. L. 



383 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

uprooted by tornadoes, or any other cause, to a state of putri(]it)% 
and finally to dust. Other beetles, of smaller dimensions, and 
of a cylindrical form, which take their station between the bark 
and the wood, are instrumental in separating them so as to let 
in the wet,^ and expose the timber more effectaally to the action 
of the elements. 

The great majority, indeed, of this interesting Order derive 
their nutriment, in their first and last states, from the vegetable 
kingdom. The Latnellicorns afford a conspicuous instance of 
this. Even those of them that are coprophagous, feed upon 
vegetable detritus in some degi^ee animahzed ; and some are 
stated to feed indifferently both on excrement and leaves.^ 
The giants of the Order, the mighty Dynastidans,^ appear to 
feed upon putrescent timber, burrowing in it as well as in the 
earth. The Melolonthidans, in their first slate, devour the 
roots of grass, &c., whence one of the modern genera into 
which they are divided is named the root-eater ;* in their per- 
fect state, they emerge from their subterranean dwellings, and 
attack the leaves of trees and shrubs, and are sometimes very 
injurious to them. Again, there are others, which, as it were, 
disdaining such coarse food, devour the blossoms themselves, 
whence Latreille calls them Anthobians : and lastly, the lovely 
iribe of Cetoniadans, to which the rose-beetle^ belongs, imbibe 
the nectar of the flowers they frequent. 

Many of the weevil tribes are very destructive to stored 
grain f and others equally so to certain fruits.'' 

Though the Hymenoptera and JSTeuroptera Orders are most 
celebrated for the associaticns which certain tribes instinctively 
form, this principle does not act in them solel}^ other Insects 
have their swarms at certain seasons, as in the case of the New 
Holland butterflies before noticed ; and the beetles airord several 
instances of it. About the time of the summer solstice, the 
solstitial beetle^ may be seen and lieard buzzing in vast num- 
bers over the trees and hedges, and a little earlier the cock- 
chafer^ does the same, nnd many others of the same family." 
Lacordaire observed, in Brazil, that two species o( diamond bee- 

1 Introd. to Ent. i. 235. 260. 

2 Lacordaire, Ann. des Sc. JVat. xx. 260. 

3 Dynastcs. MLoay. A Rhizoimsrus. 
5 Cetonia aurata. G Calandrn. 

7 Cordt/lia Ptihnaruin 8 EliJzntroo-us solstitialu-. 

V MelolontJia viil[r(iris U) HopIia,Si.c. 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 



383 



tles^ clustered so on some kinds of Mimosa, ihat the branches 
bent, under the weight of their gUltering burthen.^ 

The same author mentions a curious distinction between 
the himinosity of the glow-worms and fire-flies in Brazil, wliich 
has been confirmed to me by a gentleman sometime resident 
in that country. In the former, he says the light perpetually 
scintillates, but in the latter it is constant f the kind of glow- 
worm most common in that part of America, belongs to a 
tribe in which the shield of the thorax does not cover the eyes, 
and the females is winged as well as the male.* Thus in 
these little illuminators of tropical nights we have a kind of 
mimic stars and planets, the former of which are so numerous 
as to fill the air with their scintillations. 

The immediate object of this faculty, in these beetles, and 
in other insects, has not been clearly ascertained; as the fe- 
males are usually most luminous, it may be to allure the male; 
or, as most insects fly to the light, it may also bring their prey 
within their reach ; or, again, it may be a defence from their 
own nocturnal enemies;^ but whatever be its object with re- 
spect to the animals themselves that are gifted with this faculty, 
they give man an opportunity of glorifying his Creator, not 
only for the starry heavens, but also for these little flying stars 
that render night so beautiful and so interesting, where they 
occur. 

In considering the great Class of Insects with reference to 
their office, the first thing that strikes us is their infinite num- 
ber, not only of individuals of the same species, but of diflf'erent 
species and even genera, and the vast variety of forms and 
structures that they necessarily include. When we began the 
present subject, and, dipping under the waves of ocean, visited 
the vast world of waters, to survey their various inhabitants; 
even amongst those that can be seen only by the assisted eye, 
we saw no traces of such diversity; the number oi mdividuals, 
it is true, were incalculable, but though they have been the 
objects of research, with so many inquirers, and for so long a 
period, the number of species known fall short of half a thou- 
sand, while the number of Insects already in cabinets are 
stated to be more than two hundred times that number, and 



1 Entimus imperialis, and nobilis. 2 ^im. des Sc. JYai. xx. 161. 

3 Ann. des Sc. Nat xx. 247. 

4 In the Introduction to Entomology^ (ii. 407) this genu6- is named Pygo- 
lampis, after Aristotle, Hist. Anim. 1. iv. c I. 

5 See above, p. 308. 



384 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

even, in our own country, more than ten thousand have been 
enumerated and named. 

The momentum of so vast a body of animals, everywhere 
dispersed, and daily and hourly at work in their several depart- 
ments, must be incalculable; and tliis momentum must be 
doubled by the circumstance that so singularly disiinguislies a 
large proportion of them ; I mean that the different periods of 
their existence are passed under different forms, during which 
they have quite different functions assigned them, and are fitted 
with different organs, being, when they are first disclosed from 
the egg, masticators of solid and grosser food, and in their last 
state imbibing nectareous fluids. The connection of the first 
is with the leaves of the plant, to them they are_ committed by 
the mother as soon as they are extruded from her matrix, and 
they supply them with their earliest and latest food; but when 
she is disclosed in all her beauty, dressed as it were in her bri- 
dal robes, the connection is between her and the Jioicer, her 
lovely analogue, from them she imbibes the sweet fluid which 
their nectaries furnish, and now, instead of a devourer, she ab- 
stracts merely what is redundant, which, while it contributes 
to her own enjoyment and support, in the case of the bee, en- 
riches man himself. 

We behold, then, this immense army of devourers, varying 
so infinitely in their instincts, as well as their forms, supplying 
many animals with the whole of their subsistence, and forming 
a considerable portion of that of others, and feel convinced that 
Providence has not placed them in their position, and given 
them such a variety of organs, except with the view to some 
great general benefit to those animals amongst whom he has 
placed them ; and this benefit is not so much perhaps the 
reducing the numbers of their own class within due limits, 
though that is a most important object, as removing nusiances, 
which would deform, or in any way infect the earth and its 
inhabitants. For this the Insect world is principally distin- 
guished as to its functions. It consists of the scavengers of 
the earth, and the pruners of its too luxmiant productions. 

With respect to ornament and pleasurable sensations, which 
were certainly the object of our beneficent Creator, as well as 
our profit and utility — next to the birds, nothing adds more to 
the life of the scene before us, during the diurnal hotns, and 
even sometimes the nocturnal, than the vast variety of insects 
that are flying, running, and jumping about in all directions, 
all engaged in their several pursuits, — the bees humming over 
the flowers; the butterflies opening and shutting their painted 
wings to the sun ; (he gnats, and gnat-like flies, rising and 



INSECT CONDYLOPES. 385 

falling alternately in the sunbeams; the beetle wheeling his 
droning flight; others coursing over the ground; the grasshop- 
per chirping in every bank, — all adding to the general har- 
mony, and combining to make the general picture one of life 
and Love; and speaking, each in different sort and manner, 
the praises of its Creator, and calling upon man to join in the 
general hymn. 



Yir 



CHAPTER XXI. 

Functions and Instincts. Fishes. 

The animals we have hitherto considered have been destitute 
of an internal jointed vertebral column and its bony appen- 
dages ; and though some, as the Cephalopods and some slugs,* 
have a kind of internal bone, and in one Order of Polypes^ the 
axis is sometimes articulated, yet these, especially in the latter 
instance, merely indicate an analogical relation, but no affi- 
nity. In none of these instances is this internal bone perforated 
for the passage of a spinal marrow, as in a real vertebrated 
column ; we now, however, enter that superior section of the 
animal kingdom, the individuals belonging to which, with 
scarcely any exception, are built upon the column in question, 
incasing a spinal marrow, and terminated at its upper extremity 
by a bony casket, calculated to contain and protect the most 
precious and wonderful of all material substances, the cerebral 
pulp, by which the organs of sense perceive ; the will moves 
the members; the mind governs the outward frame; and, in 
the king of animals, an immortal spirit, is enabled to seek and 
secure a higher destiny. 

This change in the structure of animals was rendered neces- 
sary by an increase in their bulk, for though there are some of 
the invertebrated Sub-kingdom, as the fixed Polypes and several 
of the Cephalopods, that are of as large dimensions, and a few 
of the vertebrated, as the humming birds,^ and the harvest 
mouse,* that are not so large as some insects; yet the gene- 
rality of those distinguished by a vertebral column form a strik- 
ing contrast, as to magnitude, with those that are not. Besides 
this, as these animals, by the will of their Creator, were to be 
endowed as they ascended in the scale, with gradually increas- 
ing intellectual faculties, it was necessary that the principal 
seat of those faculties should be differently organized. A dif- 
ferent organ of respiration also, as well as of circulation, in the 



1 See above, p. 164. 2 JHd. p. 04. 

3 Trochilus. 4 .MttJt mejisorius. 



FISHES. 387 

great body of vertebrates, required an internal cavity defended 
from the effects of pressure. 

Having premised these general observations, we are next to 
consider what animals form the basis of the vertebrated Sub- 
kingdom. Most modern zoologists appear to be of opinion that 
the Fishes occupy this position, and, taking all circumstances 
into consideration, this seems the station assigned to ihem by 
their Creator ; still there are characters in some of the Reptiles 
that seem to connect them more immediately with the Insects. 
The metamorphoses, particularly of the Batrachian Order, are 
of this description ; as is likewise the carapace, or shell of the 
Cheloniaias, of which the vertebral column and ribs form the 
basis. Those extraordinary animals, the hag* and the lam- 
prey,^ half worms and half fish, by means of the leech, evi- 
dently connect the Fishes with the Annelidans.^ Perhaps those 
butterflies of the ocean, the flying fishes,* with their painted 
wing-fins with branching rays, may look towards the Lepidop- 
tera amongst Insects, but there is no direct connection at pre- 
sent discovered between the two Classes. 

The characters of the Class of Fishes are — Body with a ver- 
tebral column, covered with scales, and moved hy fins. Respi- 
ration by permanent gills. Heart with only one auricle and 
one ventricle; blood red, cold. 

Fishes are distinguished from the other vertebrated animals, 
especially birds and beasts, by their mode of respiration; the 
latter breathing the atmospheric air, are furnished with lungs, 
which receive that element, oxygenate the blood, and again 
expel it in a diflferent state; while the former, which must de- 
compose the water for respiration, breathe by means of gills, 
found also in many invertebrates ; these are usually long, point- 
ed plates, disposed like the plumules of a feather, or teeth of a 
comb, in fishes attached to bony or cartilaginous bows ; each 
of them, according to Cuvier, covered by a tissue of innume- 
rable blood-vessels ; but, according to Dr. Virey,^ having a 
minute vein and artery. In the gill of a cod-fish, which I 
have just examined under a microscope, a vein and artery 
traverse each plate longitudinally at the margin, which appear 
to be pectinated, at right angles on each side, with innumera- 
ble minute branches, and resemble, in this respect, the gills of 
Crustaceans.^ Thus the blood is oxygenated by the air mixed 

1 Gastrobranchus. {Myxine. L.) 2 Pteromyzon. 

3 Sir E. Home, Philos. Trans. 1815, 265. 4 Exocatus volitans, &c. 

5 JV. D. D'H. JV. iv. 330. 6 Latr. Cours. D'Ent. t. 2./. 2. 



388 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

with the water, and carried to the heart, whence it is distri- 
buted to the whole body. So that the aerated water produces 
the same effect upon the blood in the branchial vessels, as the 
air does upon that in our lungs. 

We know, by experience, how soon an animal that breathes 
by lungs, if it remains only a few minutes under water, and is 
cut off from all communication with the atmosphere, is suffo- 
cated and dies; and that all aquatic animals that have not 
gills, or something analogous, as all the water-beetles, the 
larves of gnats, &c. are obHged, at certain intervals, to seek 
the surface for respiration. Whence we may learn what an 
admirable contrivance of Divine Wisdom is here presented to 
us, to enable the infinite host of fishes to breathe as easily in 
the water as we do in the air. 

When we sum up all the diagnostics of the Class we are 
considering, we can trace, at every step, so that, almost, he 
that runs may read, Infinite Power in the construction. Infinite 
Wisdom in the contrivance and adaptations, and Infinite Good- 
ness in the end and object of all the various physical laws, 
and in all the structures and organizations by which they are 
severally executed, which strike the reflecting mind in this 
globe of ours. What else could have peopled the waters, and 
the air, with a set of beings so perfectly and beautifully in con- 
trast with each other, as the fishes and the birds. Sprung 
originally from the same element, they each move, as it were, 
in an ocean of their own, and by the aid of similar, though 
not the same, means. The grosser element they inhabit re- 
quired a different set of organs to defend, to propel and guide, 
and to sink and elevate the fish, from what were requisite to 
effect the same purposes for the bird, which moves in a rarer 
and purer medium ; yet as both vjere fluid mediums, consisting 
of the same elements, though differently combined; analogous 
organs, though differing in substance, structure, and nuniber, 
were required. For what difference is there between swim- 
ming and flying, except the element in which these motions 
take place? The fish may be said lo fly in the icater, and the 
bird to swim in the air; but perhaps the movements of the 
aquatic animal, from its greater flexibility and the number of 
its motive organs, is more graceful and elegant than tliose of 
the aerial. The feathers of the one are analogous to the scales 
of the other; tfie ivings to the pectoral fins; and the tail of 
hoih acts the part of a rudder, by which each steers itself 
through the waves of its own element. 

One distinctive character of fishes is taken from the scales 
that cover and protect their soft and flexile forms from injury. 



FISHES. ^ 389 

Scales, however, are not peculiar to fishes, since many reptiles, 
as the Saurians, and some quadrupeds, as the Pangolin,* are 
armed by them. Scarcely any species of fish is really without 
them. In some, upon which when living they are not discover- 
able under a microscope, when they are dead, and the skin is 
dry, scales are readily detected and detached. These organs 
vary greatly in form : sometimes they resemble spines, at others 
they are tuberculated ; but most commonly they are plates, 
often carinated, and varying in shape, some being round, others 
oval, others again angular; sometimes also they are finely den- 
ticulated. In some fish they are separated, in others they 
touch, often so as to form together the resemblance of a beauti- 
ful piece of mosaic, and in many they are imbricated.^ In those 
that rarely approach the shore, and are exposed only to slight 
friction, they are fastened by a smaller portion of their circum- 
ference ; but in in-shore fishes they are more firmly fixed, and 
covered partly by the epidermis, which, in those that live and 
burrow in the mud, almost entirely envelopes them. Some 
fishes set up their spines like a hedgehog ; and most, when 
alarmed, seem to have the power of erecting them more or 
less. Had we the means of ascertaining the situation and cir- 
cumstances of every individual, we should find that, in every 
case, the figure and connexion, and substance of the scales, 
was ruled by them. A proof of this may be seen in those fishes 
whose integument consists of hard scales, united together so as 
to form a tesselated coat of mail. I allude to the Ostracions, 
whose organs of locomotion seem not calculated to effect their 
escape when pursued ; the want of speed, however, is compen- 
sated by a covering that the teeth of few of their enemies can 
penetrate : the same remark applies to those fishes that can in- 
flate themselves into a globe,* in some of which the fins are so 
minute, as to be scarcely discoverable. In these ihe scaly 
spines, when erected, assist in preventing the attack of ene- 
mies. 

I have given a detailed account of ihe fins of fishes on a for- 
mer occasion.* I shall therefore here only consider the mo- 
tions of which they are the organs, and their theatre. 

Though the birds — if we consider the whole atmosphere of 
the globe, whether expanded over earth or sea, as their domain 
— may perhaps have a wider range than the fishes, yet when 
we further consider that, besides the whole exlentof the ocean, 
and the seas in connexion with it, with all its unfathomable 

1 Manis. 2 Roget, B. T. i. 116. 

3 Roget, B. T. i. 433. 4 See ibove, p. 261. 



390 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

(leplhs and abysses, and all the rivers that flow into it — all the 
innumerable lakes also, and other stagnant waters, on moun- 
tains, and at every other elevation, that the earth's surface 
coDtiiins, belong lo the fishes, and compare at the same time 
the greatest depth to which they descend with the greatest 
height to which birds ascend, we may conclude that, with re- 
gard to its extent, their habitable world may be nearly commen- 
surate with that of their rivals or analogues. 

As to their motions, in their element, birds of the most rapid 
and unwearied wing must yield the palm to them ; the eagle 
to the shark, and the swallow to the herring and salmon. The 
form of fishes, generally speaking, is paiticularly calculated for 
swift and easy motion ; and the resistance of the fluid in which 
they move seems never to impede their progress. While birds 
that undertake long flights are often obhged to alight upon 
vessels for some rest and renovation of strength, fishes never 
seem exhausted by fatigue, and to require no respite or repose. 
Sharks have been known to keep pace with ships during long 
voyages ; and, like dogs, they will sport round vessels going at 
several knots an hour, as if they had plenty of spare force.* 
The thunny darts with the rapidity of an arrow, and the her- 
ring goes at the rate of sixteen miles per hour. But though 
many fishes thus pursue an unwearied course without any in- 
tervals of repose, yet there are some that often appear to sleep. 
Inflating its natatory vesicle, our fresh-water shark, the pike, 
in the heat of the day, rises nearly to the surface, and there 
remains perfectly motionless and apparently asleep : at this 
time he is easily snared, by passing a running noose of wure 
over his tail, and by a sudden jerk bringing him on shore. 

The eye of fishes is like that of the higher animals, but of a 
substance that makes the access of the water to it no more 
troublesome than that of the air to terrestrial animals. Gene- 
rally speaking, it is protected by no eyelid or nictitant mem- 
brane. One genus, however, removed from the gobies,^ has 
the former; and a species of bodian,^ from the equatorial seas, 
has a movable membranous valve above each eye, with which, 
at will, it can cover it, that seems analogous to the latter. 
The eye of the eel, and other serpentiform fishes, which are 
usually buried and move about in the mud, is covered, through 
the provident care of their Creator, b}^ an immovable mem- 
brane ; and in several species the organ can be withdrawn to 
the bottom of the socket, and even concealed, in part, under 

I JV. D. D' Hist. Nat. xxvii. 247. 2 Pcriophthalmui. 

3 B. palpebratus. 



PISHES. 391 

its margin. But the most singular kind of eye in the Class, 
and that in which the forethought of the Deity is most conspi- 
cuous, is that of the Anableps, a viviparous fish, inhabiting the 
rivers of Surinam, and called by the natives the four-eyed fish. 
If the cornea of this eye be examined attentively it will be 
found that it is divided info two equal portions, each forming 
part of an individual sphere, placed one above and the other 
below, and united by a little narrow membranous, but not dia- 
phanous, band, which is nearly horizontal when the fish is in 
its natural position ; if the lower portion be examined, a rather 
large iris and pupil will be seen, with a crystalline humour 
under it, and a similar one with a still larger pupil in the upper 
portion. The object of Divine Wisdom in this un parallelled 
structure, if we may conjecture from the circumstances of the 
animal, is to enable it to see near and distant objects at the 
same time — the little worms below it that form its food, with 
one pupil and iris, and the great fishes above it or at a distance, 
which it may find it expedient to guard against, with the 
other. 

The senses of smell and hearing have no external avenue 
in fishes. The former is the most acute of all their senses. 
Lacepede says it may be called their real eye, since by it they 
can discover their prey or their enemies at an immense dis- 
tance ; they are directed'by it in the thickest darkness, and the 
most agitated waves. The organs of this sense are between 
the eyes. The extent of the membranes on which the olfac- 
tory nerves expand, in a shark twenty-five feet long, is calcu- 
lated to be twelve or thirteen square feet. 

The teeth of fishes may be divided into the same kinds as 
those of quadrupeds ; they have their laniary, incisive, and 
molary teeth ; they are differently distributed, according to the 
species and mode of life ; some are almost immovably fixed in 
bony sockets, others in membranous capsules, by which means 
they can be elevated or depressed at the will of the animal. 
They not only have often many rows of teeth in their mouth, 
but even their palate, their throat, and their tongue are some- 
times thus armed.^ And this accumulation of teeth is not 
confined to the fiercest monsters of the deep, but even some 
herbivorous fishes have several rows of molary teeth. An in- 
stance of this is afforded by a jaw of some unknown fish, per- 
haps a Siluridan, in my possession, in which there are six rows 
of such teeth, the anterior ones being somewhat conical. This 
specimen was found on the shore of one of the lakes in Canada, 

1 Plate XIII. Fig. 3. 



392 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

and belonged to a fish, which the friend who gave it to me 
stated was much leHshed by the Indians. 

Many of the organs of the members of this Class are more 
independent of each other than those of warm-blooded animals ; 
they seem less connected with common centres, in this respect 
resembling vegetables, for they may be more materially altered, 
more desperately wounded, and more completely destroyed, 
without any mortal effect. Many of their parts, as the fins, if 
mutilated, can be reproduced. Indeed a fish, as well as a 
reptile, can be cut, torn, or dismembered without appearing to 
suffer materially. The shark, from which a harpoon has taken 
a portion of its flesh, pursues his prey with the usual avidity, 
if his blood has not been too much exhausted. We see in this 
a merciful provision, that animals so much exposed to injury 
should suffer less from it than those which are better protected, 
either by their situation or structure. 

Fishes are amongst the most long-lived animals. A pike 
was taken, in 1754, at Kaiserslautern, which had a ring fast- 
ened to the gill-covers, from which it appeared to have been 
put into the pond of that castle by the order of Frederick the 
Second, in 1487, a period of two hundred and sixty-seven years. 
It is described as being nineteen feet long, and weighing three 
hundred and fifty pounds ! ! 

Though the animals of the Class under consideration are not 
generally remarkable for their sagacity, yet they are capable 
of instruction. Lacepede relates that some, which for more 
than a century had been kept in the basin of the Tuilleries, 
would come when they were called by their names ; and that 
in many parts of Germany trout, carp, and tench are summoned 
to their food by the sound of a bell.^ 

At the first blush it seems as if fishes took little care or 
thought for their offspring ; but when we inquire into the sub- 
ject, we find them assiduous to deposit their eggs in such situa- 
tions as are best calculated to ensure their hatching, and to 
supply the wants of their young when hatched; but sometimes 
they go further, and prepare regular nests for their young. 
Two species, called by the Indians, though of different genera,* 
by the name of the Jiat-head and round-head hassar, have this 
instinct, and construct a nest, the former of leaves and the latter 
of grass, in which they deposit their eggs, and then cover them 
very carefully ; and both sexes, for they are monogamous, 
watch and defend them till the young come forth. General 

1 Hist, dcs Poiss. Introd. cxxx. 2 Doras oiid CaUicthtjs. 



FISHES. 393 

Hardwicke mentions a parallel inslancein \he goramy,^ of the 
Isle of Fiance, a fish of the size of the tuibot, and superior to 
it in flavour, cultivated in the ponds of 1 hat island. 

It has been observed that some fishes, when dead, emit a 
phosphoric light, I have particularly noticed this in the mack- 
arel, but others do this when living. The sun-fish'^ which 
sometimes has been found of an enormous bulk,'* when swim- 
ming yields a light, which looks like the reflection of the moon 
in the water, whence it has also been called the moon-fish — 
and the spectator in vain searches for that planet in the heavens. 
Sometimes many individuals swim together, and by their mul- 
tiplied luminous disks, generally at some distance, compose a 
singular and startling spectacle; and if we take into considera- 
tion the magnitude of these animals,* we may conceive the 
wonder and amazement that would agitate the mind of any 
one when he first beheld such an army of great lights moving 
through the waters. For what purpose Providence has gifted 
the sun-fish with this property, and how it is produced, has not 
been ascertained. It may either be for defence or illumination. 

Few animals, with regard to magnitude, present to the eye 
such enormous masses as some fishes ; leaving the whale out of 
the question, which though aquatic, belong to another Class, 
what quadruped can compete with the sharks which is also a 
phosphoric fish. That tribe called by the French Requins,^ 
w^hich is thought to be synonymous with the Carcharias of the 
Greeks, and one of which was probably the sea-monster, mis- 
translated the whale, which swallowed the disobedient prophet 
— are stated to exceed thirty feet in length ; another® of a dif- 
ferent tribe, is still larger, sometimes extending to the enor- 
mous length of more than forty feet ! \^ Next to the sharks, 
the rays, nearly akin to them, exceed in their magnitude; they 
are sometimes called sea-eagles, because in their rage and fury 
they occasionally elevate themselves from the water, and fall 
again with such force as to make the sea foam and thunder. 
An individual of a species^ of this tribe, called by the sailors 
the sea-devil, taken at Barbadoes, was so large, as to require 
seven pairs of oxen to draw it on shore ! !^ 

1 Ospkromemts olfax. 2 Mola. 

3 One is said to have been caught in the Irish sea twenty-five feet long ! ! 
— Lacep. Hist. 511, 

4 Hist, of Watcrford, 371. Borlase, Cornw. SfiT. 

5 Carcharias. Cuv. G Squalus maxhnus. 

7 N D. D'H. JV. xxix. 192. xxxii. 74. 

8 Raia Banksiana. 9 La^ep. Hist, dcs Poiss. ii. IIG. 

zz 



394 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

If we consider the vast tendency to increase of the oceanic 
tribes, that where a terrestrial animal gives birth to a single 
individual, a marine one perhaps produces a million^ we may 
conceive that if no check was provided to keep their numbers 
within due hmits, they would so fill the waters as to interfere 
with each other's and the general welfare. The Cod-fish 
alone, which, according to Leeuwenhoek and Lacepede,^ pro- 
duces more than nine millions of eggs in one year, if neither 
man, nor shark nor other predaceous fish, made it their food, 
would so fill the ocean in congenial climates, in the course of 
no long period of time, that there would scarcely be space for 
the motions or life of any other marine animal: the same may 
be said of almost all the migratory fishes. In these circum- 
'Stances we see the reason why such enormous monsters were 
created that could swallow them by hundreds, why their yawn- 
ing mouth and throat were planted with teeth and fangs of 
different descriptions, fixed and movable, arranged in many a 
fearful row of bristling points, and why this tremendous array 
has been mustered in the mouth of animals of such never-sated 
voracity, and of such unmitigated cruelty and ferocity. 

Still though the scene is one of blood and slaughter, yet He 
whose tender mercies are over all his works, has fitted the 
creatures exposed to it for their lot. Cold-blooded animals, as 
I lately observed, do not suffer from the various dismember- 
ments to which their situation exposes them, like those of a 
higher and warmer ternperature, whence we may conclude, 
that great pain and anguish are not felt by them. 

Another function of these tremendous animals is to devour 
all carcasses, which, from whatever cause, are floating in the 
water, thus they act the same part in disinfecting and purify- 
ing the ocean, that the hyaenas and vultures, their terrestrial 
analogues, and other animals do, upon earth. 

Another lesson may be learned from the existence of these 
terrible monsters ; for if God fitted them to devour, he fitted 
them also to instruct. The existence of creatures so evil, and 
such relentless destroyers of his works in the material world, 
teach us that there are probably analogous beings in the spiri- 
tual world ; and what occasion we have for watchfulness, to es- 
cape their destructive fury. 

There is nothing more remarkable in the Class we are con- 
sidering than the infinite variety and singularity of the figures 
and shapes of fishes. It has been thought that the ocean con- 
tains representatives of every terrestrial and aerial form. How- 

1 Leeuwenh. Episl. iii. 188. Lacep. Hist. Ibid. 393- 



FISHES. 



395 



ever this be, it may be asserted that the forms of fishes are 
more singular and extraordinary, more grotesque, and mon- 
strous, than those of any other department, of the animal king- 
dom ; but on this subject I need not enlarge. 

Having made these general remarks upon fishes, I shall 
next say something on their Classification. Of all the Classes 
of animals, that of fishes, as Baron Cuvier observes, is the most 
difficult to divide into Orders. Linne considered what have 
been usually denominated Cartilaginous Fishes, as forming a 
section of his Amphibians ;* but the former illustrious naturalist 
has very judiciously arranged them with the fishes. Ichthyol- 
ogists in general agree with Cuvier in dividing this Class into 
two Sub-classes — viz. Osseans, in which the skeleton is bony 
and formed of bony fibres; and Cartilagineans, in which it is 
cartilaginous and formed of calcareous grains. Lacepede, the 
most eminent of modern Ichthyologists, has observed that there 
is a striking resemblance or analogy between certain points of 
these two Sub-classes, of which he has given a table drawn up 
in a double series, which I shall here subjoin. 

CARTILAGINEANS. OSSEANS. 

Petromyzon. Gastrobranchus. . . , . . CcBcilia. Murana. Ophis.. 

Raia Pleuronectes. 

Squalus Esox, 

Accipenser Loricaria. 

SyngTiathus Fistularia^ 

Pegasus - . . . Trigla. 

Torpedo. Tetrodon. Gymnotus. Silurus. 

Cuvier also remarks, with respect to the animals of the pre- 
sent Class, that they form two distinct series,^ which in another 
place he says, cannot be considered as either superior or inferior 
to each other. 

Many genera of the Cartilagineans, he thinks, approach the 
Reptiles by some parts of their organization, whilst it is almost 
doubtful whether others do not belong to the Invertebrates.* 
He has made no remark with respect to the connection of the 
Osseans with the above Class : though his thirteenth Family 
consists of fishes that have always gone by the name of fishing- 
frogs,* fwm. the resemblance which they exhibit to that animal, 
and from their pectoral fins assuming the appearance of legs.^ 
The species of one genus^ resemble a fish with a lizard on its 

1 JVantes. 2 R^gne Anim. ii. 128. 

3 Tbid. 376. 4 Lophius. L. 

5 Plate XIll. Fig. 1. 6 Malthus. 



'596 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

back, the head being overshadowed by a conical horizontal 
horn, in the sides of which the eyes are fixed, so that the lower 
lobe simulates the head of a fish, and the upper one that of a 
lizard.* This family of fishes, as well as the lump-fish,^ in his 
Lectures on Comparative Anatomy, Cuvier classed with the Car- 
tilagineans. 

It is not to be expected that I should be able to thread my 
way through a labyrinth, in which this great man confesses 
himself to be at a loss ; and therefore I shall not attempt any 
alteration of his system, though confessedly the reverse of natw 
ral with respect to the Orders into which he divides it, but 
leave the subject to an abler hand, M. Agassiz, who is reported 
to have undertaken it, and in the mean time, give a popular 
summary of Baron Cuvier's Orders, as I find them in the last 
edition of the R^gne Animal. 

Sub-class 1. — The Cartilagineans, which, as allied to the 
Annelidans, I shall place first, are divided by Cuvier into three 
"Orders,^ viz. the Cyclostomes, or suckers; the Selacians ; and 
the Sturionians. 

Order 1. — The Cyclostomes, or suckers, with regard to their 
skeletons, are the most imperfect of all the Vertebrates. They 
have neither pectoral nor ventral fins. Their body, apparently 
he«jidless and eyeless, terminates anteriorly in a circular or 
semicircular fleshy lip, supported by a cartilaginous ring. 
Their gills consist of pouches instead of pectinated organs. 
By means of their mouth, which, as well as the tongue, is 
armed with teeth, they fix themselves to fishes, and derive 
their nutriment from them. The lamprey,^ lampenie,^ and hag, 
&c. belong to this Order. 

Order 2. — The Selacians have gills, fixed by their outer 
margin, and not disengaged as in the Osseans, and they ex- 
pel the water by lateral openings. To this Order the sharks 
and the rays belong. 

Order 3. — The Sturionians agree with the Ossean Fishes in 
their gills, but their skeleton is cartilaginous. They have only 
a single orifice, covered with an operculum. The sole genera 
included in this Order are the Sturgeon^ and the Sea-ape.^ 

Sub-class 2. — The Osseans Cuvier divides in four Orders, 



1 Plate XIII. Fig. 2 2 CydoptcrtUi. 

3 Ubi supr. 128. where Cuvier arranges them in the Order here adopted, 
but when lie gives the details of the Sub-class, he reverses it. Ibid. ^S. 

4 Petromyzon fluvial is, t&c. 5 P. brancfn/tlis ? 

6 Jiccipcnscr. 7 Chim<rra •ninnsfrosa. 



FISHES. 397 

viz. Acanthopterygians, J\Ialacopterygians, Lophobranchians, and 
Plectognalhians. These Orders, for reasons before assigned,i I 
shall reverse. 

Order 1. (Cuv. 6.) — PlectognathianF\s\\es. Gill-covers con- 
cealed under a thick skin. Ribs rudimental. Ventral fins 
wanting. To this Order belong the Coat of Mail-fishy'^ the 
Sun-fishy^ and the Bladder-fish^ 

Order 2. (Cuv. 5.) — Lophobranchian Fishes. So called be- 
cause their gills are not pectinated, but disposed in tufts, as is 
the case hkewise with some Annelidans;^ body ridged longitu- 
dinally, covered with hard scales, united to each other ; mouth 
elongated. To this Order belong those singular animals — 
the dragonet,^ the horse-head,"" or sea-horse, and the spa-needle.^ 

Order 3. {Cuv. 2.) — Malacopterygian, or soft-rayed Fishes. 
Rays not spiny, except sometimes the first of the dorsal or pec- 
toral fins. This great Order Cuvier divides into three Orders, 
or rather Sub-orders, which I shall give inversely. 

Sub-order I. {Cuv. 4.) — Apode Malacopterygians. Body sex- 
pentiform, elongated ; skin thick, soft, and slimy. To this 
Sub-order belong the common-eel,^ the conger-eel,^^ and the eZec- 
tric-eel,^^ which have many points in common with the cyclos- 
tomous fishes of the preceeding Sub-class, and with respect to 
their form seem to look both towards the Jlnnelidans, and more 
especially to the Ophidian Reptiles. 

Sub-order 2. {Cuv. 3.) — The Sub-brachian Malacoptery- 
gians. Ventral fins attached under the pectoral. In this Order 
we find the sucking-fish,^^ the lump-fish,^^ the flat-fishes, and the 
cod-fish,^"^ which seems an heterogenous mixture ; the flat-fishes 
seem clearly entitled to rank as an Order. 

Sub-order S. {Cuv. 2.) — Abdominal Malacopterygians. Ven- 
tral fins attached under the abdomen and behind the pectoral. 
Here, as we ascend, we meet with the sprat,^^ the herring,^^ the 
hassar,^^ the salmon,^^ the anableps, the roach,^^ tench,^^ and carp.^^ 

Order 4. {Cuv. 1.) — The Acanthopterygians, or spiny-rayed 



1 


See above, pp. 78, 358. 


2 


Ostracion. 


3 


Mola. 


4 


Diodon. 


5 


See above, p. 257. 


6 


Pegasus. 


7 


Hippocampus. 


8 


Syngnathus. 


9 


Murcma Jinguilla. 


10 


M. Conger. 


11 


Gymnotus. 


12 


Echeneis. 


13 


Cyclopterus. 


14 


Gadus. 


15 


Clupea Sprattus. 


16 


C. Harengus. 


17 


Doras. Callicthys. 


18 


Salmo. 


19 


Cyprinus rutilus 


20 


C. Tinea. 


21 


C. Carpio. 







39S FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Fishes. First rays of the dor-sal fin, or of the first dorsal fin, 
spiny, or dorsal spines in the place of dorsal fins. Under this 
vast Order are arranged an infinity of families and genera, 
which Cuvier seems to lament that he was obliged to leave 
together/ The tobacco -pipefish,^ the razorfish,^ the fishing- 
frogs,'^ the lyre-fish,^ the John Dory,^ the sic or d- fish,'' the mack- 
arel,^ the gurnard,^ the mullets,^° and the perch,^^ are amongst 
those that belong to this Order. 

It is impossible to consider the Orders of Fishes as we have 
done those of Insects, and give any satisfacior}^ account of the 
functions and instincts of the several families and tribes that 
compose them. We cannot dip beneath the waves, to visit 
the depths of the ocean, that we may investigate their man- 
ners and history, but, doubtless, we may conclude, that the 
same Wisdom, Power, and Goodness, which we find so visibly 
manifested in the structure and operations of all the animals 
that are under our eyes and inspection, have equal place and 
are equally conspicuous, when brought into view, in the ma- 
rine and other aquatic animals. We know by experience that 
a large portion of them are of the greatest benefit to mankind, 
and the rest, from the gigantic shark to the pigmy minnow, 
each in their place, and engaged in the fulfilment of their sev- 
eral functions, are, we may conclude, equally beneficial, though 
in a way t.hat we cannot fully appreciate. 

I have had more than one occasion to enlarge upon some of 
those parts of the history of fishes with which we are acquaint- 
ed,*^ 1 shall therefore only add here some particulars with re- 
spect to the habits of a few individuals which may throw some 
light upon their history. 

Amongst the Cyclostomous Cartilagineans the hag is dis- 
tinguished by a singular means of escape from its enemies. 
This animal adheres to fishes by creating a vacuum by means 
of its lips ; this effected, it lacerates them with its teeth, without 
their being able to shake it off, and then, like the leech, it 
sucks their blood and juices ; but since, when thus fixed and 
employed, it might easily become the prey of other fishes, 
Providence has enabled it to conceal itself from them, by means 



1 


RhgneAnim. ii. 131. 


2 


Fishdaria. 


3 


Coryphcma. 


4 


Lophuts. Malthus, Batrachus 


5 


CaUionijmns Lyra. 


6 


Zeus. Faber. 


7 


Xiphias. 


8 


Scomber Scombnis. 


9 


Trigla Gui-nardus 


10 


Mullus, 


11 


Perca. 


12 


See above, pp. 57 — 66. 



FISHES. 399 

of the excrement which, when in danger, it emits, and which 
remains for a time near it, detained by the slime which exudes 
from its pores. This is so abundant that Kalm, having put 
one in a large tub of sea water, it became like a clear transpa- 
rent glue, from which he could draw threads, even moving the 
animal with them. A second water, upon its being again 
immersed, in a quarter of an hour, became the same. Sir E. 
Home was of opinion that these animals are hermaphrodites. 

Amongst all the diversified faculties, powers, and organs, 
with which Supreme Wisdom has gifted the members of the 
animal kingdom to defend themselves from their enemies, or 
to secure for themselves a due supply of food, none are more 
remarkable than those by which they can give them an elec- 
tric shock, and arrest them in their course, whether they are 
assailants or fugitives. That God should arm certain ^s/tes, in 
some sense, with the lightning of the clouds, and enable them 
thus to employ an element so potent and irresistible, as we do 
gunpowder, to astound, and smite, and stupify, and kill the 
inhabitants of the waters, is one of those wonders of an Al- 
mighty arm which no terrestrial animal is gifted to exhibit. 
For though some quadrupeds, as the cat, are known, at certain 
times, to accumulate the electric fluid in their fur, so as to give 
a shght shock to the hand that strokes them, it has never been 
clearly ascertained that they can employ it to arrest or bewilder 
their prey, so as to prevent their escape. Even man himself, 
though he can charge his batteries with this element, and 
again discharge them, has not yet so subjected it to his domin- 
ion, as to use it independently of other substances, offensively 
and defensively, as the electric fishes do. 

The fishes hitherto ascertained to possess this power belong 
to the genera Tetrodon, Trichiurus, Malapterurus, Crymnotus,^ 
and Raia? The most remarkable are the three last. 

The faculty of the Torpedo to benumb its prey was known to 
Aristotle,^ and Pliny further states,* that conscious of its power, 
it hides itself in the mud, and benumbs the unsuspecting fishes 
that swim over it. The Arabians, when they cultivated the 
sciences so successfully, had observed this faculty both in the 
Torpedo and the Malapterurus, and perceiving an aflinity be- 
tween the electric fluid of the heavens and that of these fishes, 
called them Raash, a name signifying thunder, 

1 The trivial name of the first four of these species is electricus. 

2 R. Torpedo. 3 Hist. An. I. ix. c. 37. 
4 Hist. J^Tat. I. ix. c. 42. 



400 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

The electric organ in the Malapterurus'^ extends all round the 
animal, immediately under the skin, and is formed of a mass of 
cellular tissue, so condensed and thick as, at first, to look like 
bacon ; closely examined, it is found to consist of tendinous 
fibres, which are interlaced together, so as to form a net work, 
the cells of which are filled with a gelatino-albuminons sub- 
stance, the whole accompanied by a nervous system, differing 
from that of the Torpedo and Electric-eel, and similar to that of 
other fishes.^ This organ is divided into two portions by a 
longitudinal septum. 

The Torpedo is the most celebrated of the electric fishes. In 
this the organ of its power extends, on each side, from the head 
and gills to the abdomen, in which space it fills all the interior 
of the body. Each organ is attached to the parts that surround 
it, by a cellular membrane and by tendinous fibres. Under the 
skin which covers the upper part of these organs, are two bands, 
one above the other, th^ upper one consisting of longitudinal 
fibres, and the lower o^ transverse ones. The latter continues 
itself in the organ by means of a great number of membranous 
elongations, which form many-sided vertical bodies, or hollow 
polygonal tubes, some hexagonal, others pentagonal, and others 
quadrangular; each of these tubes is divided, internally, by a 
fine nnembrane into several dissepiments, connected by blood- 
vessels. In each of the organs, from two hundred to twelve 
hundred of these tubes have been counted in individuals of 
different age and size, some regular but others irregular, which 
may form electric batteries. Each organ is also traversed by 
arteries, veins, and nerves, in every direction, which last are 
remarkable for their size. The tubes, like those above men- 
tioned, are also found in the non-electric Rays, but these ter- 
minate in pores without the skin, which are so many excretory 
organs of the matter contained in their interior; in the Torpedo, 
on the contrary, the tubes are completely closed, not only by 
the skin which is no where perforated, but further by the apon- 
euroses, or tendinous expansions of the muscles, which extend 
all over the electric organ ; the gelatinous matter not being 
able to expand itself externall}'^, is forced to accumulate in these 
tubes, from whence doubtless arises their size and their pro- 
gressive numerical increase. The two surfaces of the electric 
organ are supposed to be one positive and the other negative. 
Reaumur observed that the back of the animal is rather con- 
vex, but when about to strike its convexity diminishes, and it 
becomes concave, but after the stroke it resumes its convexity. 

1 Silurus. L. 2 Geoff. Si. Ui\. .Inn. du Mus. i. 402 



FISHES. 401 

These organs not only affect the animals upon which they act, 
by an agency imperceptible to the eye, but they are also stated 
to emit sparks; and they can strike at some distance, as well as 
by immediate contact. The author last named put a torpedo 
and a duck into a vessel filled with sea water, and covered it 
to prevent the escape of the latter, which, after about three 
hours, was found dead. These wonderful and complex organs, 
and their many-phialed batteries, the effect of which has at- 
tracted the notice of scientific men for so long a period, were 
doubtless given to these animals by their Creator, in lieu of the 
offensive and defensive arms which enable the rest of their 
tribe to act the part assigned to them, that they might procure 
the means of subsistence, and to defend themselves when in 
danger. Almost always concealed in the mud, like most of 
the rays, they can by this weapon kill the small fishes that 
come within the sphere of their action, or benumb the large 
ones ; if they are in danger of attack from any voracious fish, 
they can disable him by invisible blow^s, more to be dreaded 
than the teeth of the shark itself. 

The Gymnotus, or electric eel, is a still more tremendous as- 
sailant, both of the inhabitants of its own element, and even 
of large quadrupeds, and of man himself if he puts himself in 
its way. Its force is said to be ten times greater than that of 
the torpedo. This animal is a native of South America. In 
the immense plains of the Llanos, in the province of Caraccas, 
is a city called Calabozo, in the vicinity of which these eels 
abound in small streams, insomuch that a road formerly much 
frequented was abandoned on account of them, it being neces- 
sary to cross a rivulet in which many mules were annually lost 
in consequence of their attack. They are also extremely com- 
mon in every pond from the equator to the 9th degree of north 
latitude. 

Contrary to what takes place in the torpedo, the electric 
organs of the Gymnotus are placed under the tail, in a place 
removed from the vital ones. It has four of these organs, two 
large and two small, which occupy a third of the whole fish : 
each of the larger organs extends from the abdomen to the tail ; 
they are separated from each other above by the dorsal mus- 
cles, in the middle of the body by the natatory vesicle, and 
below by a particular septum. The small organs lie over the 
great ones, finishing almost at the same point ; they are pyra- 
midal, and separated from the others by membrane. The in- 
terior of all these organs presents a great number of horizontal 
septa, cut at right angles by others nearly vertical. John 
Hunter counted thirty-four in one of the great organs, and 
3 a 



402 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

fourteen in one of the small ones, in the same individual. The 
vertical septa are membranous, and so close to each other that 
they appear to touch. It is by this vast quadruple apparatus, 
which sometimes in these animals is calculated to equal one 
hundred and twenty-three square feet of surface, that they 
can give such violent shocks. Mr Nicholson thought that the 
Gymnotus could act as a battery of 1,125 square feet. Hum- 
boldt says that its galvanic electricity produces a sensation 
which might be called specifxally different from that which 
the conductor of an electric machine, or the Leyden phial, or 
the pile of Volta, cause. From placing his two feet on one of 
these fishes just taken out of the w^ater^ he received a shock 
more violent and alarming than he ever experienced from the 
discharge of a large Leyden jar ; and for the rest of the day he 
felt an acute pain in his knees, and almost all his joints. Such 
a shock, he thinks, if the animal passed over the breast and 
the abdomen, might be mortal. It is stated that when the 
animal is touched with only one hand the shock is very slight; 
but when two hands are applied at a sufficient distance, a shock 
is sometimes given so powerful as to affect the arms with a 
paralysis for many years. It is said that females, under the 
influence of a nervous fever, are not affected. 

Humboldt gives a very spirited account of the manner of tak- 
ing this animal, which is done by compelling twenty or thirty 
wild horses and mules to take the water. The Indians sur- 
round the basin into which they are driven, armed with long 
canes, or harpoons; some mount the trees whose branches hang 
over the water, all endeavouring by their cries and instruments 
to keep the horses from escaping: for a long time the victory 
seems doubtful, or to incline to the fishes. The mules, disabled 
by the frequency and force of the shocks, disappear under the 
water ; and some horses, in spite of the active vigilance of the 
Indians, gain the banks, and overcome by fatigue, and be- 
numbed by the shocks they have encountered, stretch them- 
selves at their length on the ground. There could not, says 
Humboldt, be a finer subject for a painter : groups of Indians 
surrounding the basin; the horses, with their hair on end, and 
terror and agony in their eyes, endeavouring to escape the tem- 
pest that has overtaken them ; the eels, yellowish and livid, 
looking like great aquatic serpents, swimming on the surface 
of the water in pursuit of their enemy. 

In a few minutes two horses were already drowned : the 
eel, more than five feet long, gliding under the belly of the 
horse or mule, made a discharge of its electric battery on the 
whole extent, attacking at the same instant (he heart and fho 



FISHES. 403 

I 

viscera. The animals, stupified by these repeated shocks, fall 
into a profound lethargy, and, deprived of all sense, sink under 
the water, when the other horses and mules passing over their 
bodies, they are soon drowned. The Gymnoti having thus 
discharged their accumulation of the electric fluid, now become 
harmless, and are no longer dreaded : swimming half out of 
the water, they flee from the horses instead of attacking them ; 
and if they enter it the day after the battle, they are not, mo- 
lested, for these fishes require repose and plenty of food to 
enable them to accumulate a sufficient supply of their galvanic 
electricity. It is probable that they can act at a distance, and 
that their electric shock can be communicated through a thick 
mass of water. Mr Williams, at Philadelphia, and Mr Fahl- 
berg, at Stockholm, have both seen them kill from far living 
fishes which they wished to devour: Lacepede says they can 
do this at the distance of sixteen feet. They are said also to 
emit sparks. 

Of all the Gymnoti the electric is the only species in which 
the natatory vesicle extends from the head to the tail ; it is in 
that species of the extraordinary length of two feet five inches, 
and one inch and two lines wide, but the diameter diminishes 
greatly towards the tail : it reposes upon the electric organs. 
It has been asserted that this fish is attracted by the loadstone, 
and that by contact with it it is deprived of its torporific powers.^ 

It is singular that in the three principal animals which Pro- 
vidence has signalized by this wonderful property, the organs 
of it should differ so much, both in their number, situation, and 
other circumstances; but as there appears to be little other 
connection between them, it was doubtless to accommodate 
them to the mode of life and general organization of the fishes 
so privileged. 

There is another little fish, of a very diflferent tribe, which 
emulates the electric ones, in bringing its prey within its reach, 
by discharging a grosser element at them. It belongs to a 
genus,^ the species of which are remarkable for the singularity 
of their forms, the brilliancy of their colours, and the vivacity 
of their movements. The species I allude to^ may be called 
the fly-shooter, from its food being principally flies, and other 
insects, especially those that frequent aquatic plants and places. 

1 The authors from whom my information on the electric fishes is chiefly 
derived are, Rudolphi, Jlriatomische Bemerkungen, &c. 1826 ; GeofFroy, Jinn, 
du Mas. i.; Lacepede, Hist, des Poissons; Humboldt, Observations de Zoolo- 
gie et d'Jlnatomie comparee ; and Bosc, in JV. D. D'Hist. JVat. xii. xiv. xxxiv. 

2 Ckatodon. 3 C. rostratus. 



404 FUNCTIONS AND IISSTINCTS. 

These, as Sir C. Bell relates,* it, as it were, shoots with a drop 
of water. 

In a former part of this treatise I have given an account of 
those American fishes, which, when the water fails them in the 
streams they inhabit, by means of a movable organ, repre- 
senting the first ray of their pectoral fin,^ are enabled to travel 
over land in search of one whose waters are not evaporated. 
An analogous fact has been observed in China, by a friend and 
connexion of mine,^ who paid particular attention to every 
branch of zoology when in the East. At Canton he informed 
me there is a fish that crosses the paddy fields from one creek 
to another, often a quarter of a mile asunder. The Chinese told 
him that this was done by means of a kind of leg. 

I shall close this history of Fishes with some account of the 
tribe to which the fishing-frog'^ belongs. I have before alluded 
to their connection with the Reptiles ;^ in some points also they 
look to the rays and the sharks. The attenuated tail of all,« 
and the enormous swallow of others,^ give them this resem- 
blance, especially to the first, so that the French call them fish- 
ing-rays.^ The best known of them is that called, by way of 
eminence, the fishing-frog. This is a large fish, sometimes 
seven feet long; it is found in all the European seas, and is 
often called the sea-devil. " This fish," says Lacepede, " hav- 
ing neither defensive arms in its integuments, nor force in its 
limbs, nor celerity in swimming, is, in spite of its bulk, con- 
strained to have recourse to stratagem to procure its subsist- 
ence, and to confine its chase to ambuscades, for w^hich its 
conformation in other respects adapts it. It plunges itself in 
the mud, covers itself with sea-weed, conceals itself amongst 
the stones, and lets no part of it be perceived but the extremity 
of the filaments that fringe its body, which it agitates in dif- 
ferent directions, so as to make them appear like w^orms or 
other baits. The fishes, attracted by this apparent prey, ap- 
proach, and are absorbed by a single movement of the fishing- 
frog, and swallowed by his enormous throat, where they are 
retained by the innumerable teeth with which it is armed. 
Another animal of this tribe is furnished only with a single 
bait, just above the mouth. ^ 

We see by this singular contrivance that fertility of expedi- 



1 


jB. T. 200. 




2 


Plate XII. Fio. 2. 


3 


Robert Martin, Esq. F.Z.S. 




4 


Lophius Piscator. 


.'5 


See above, p. *.105. 




() 


FlatkXUI. Fig. 1.3 


7 


Ibid. Fig 3. 




8 


liaie 'pechcrcssr. 


I) 


Malthus VcsjtatUio, Plate XII 


. Fk;. 


l.2,n. 





FISHES. 405 

ent by which the Beneficence, and Wisdom, and Power of the 
Creator have remedied the seeming defects which appear inci- 
dent to almost every animal form. If it cannot pursue and 
overtake and seize its prey, it is enabled, as in the case of the 
electric fishes y the fly -shooter, and ihe fishing-frogs, in a way we 
should not expect, to ensure its subsistence ; and, while it is 
doing this, discharging, if I may so speak, its oflicial duty, and 
acting that part, on its own theatre, by which it best contri- 
butes to the general welfare. 

Doubtless the infinite forms of the Class we are considering, 
that inhabit the, so called, element of water, and of which pro- 
bably we may still be unacquainted with a very large propor- 
tion, all bear the same relation to each other, and are organ- 
ized with a view to a similar action upon each other, that we 
see takes place upon the earth. There are predaceous fishes 
to keep the aquatic population of every description within due 
limits; there are others whose office it is to remove nuisances 
arising from putrescent substances, whether animal or vegeta- 
ble ; and lastly, there are others which, like our herds and 
flocks, are peaceful and gregarious, and graze the herbage of 
sea-weeds that cover the ocean's bed. All these, in their sev- 
eral stations, and by their several operations, glorify their Al- 
mighty Author by fulfiUing his will. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

Functions and Instincts. Reptiles. 

In the whole sphere of animals, there are none, that, from the 
earhest ages, have been more abhorred and abominated, and 
more repudiated as unclean and hateful creatures, than the 
majority of the Class we are next to enter upon, — that of Rep- 
tiles. One Order^ ^of them, indeed, consisting of the turtles 
and tortoises, and some individuals belonging to another,^ are 
exempted from this sentence, and are regarded with more fa- 
vourable eyes ; but the rest either disgust us by their aspect, or 
terrify us by their supposed or real power of injury. 

In Scripture, the serpent; the larger Saurians, under the 
names of the dragon and leviathan; and frogs are employed as 
symbols of the evil spirit, of tyrants and persecutors, and of the 
false prophets that incite them.^ 

Yet these animals exhibit several extraordinary characters 
and qualities. They are endued with a degree of vivaciousness 
that no others possess : they can endure dismemberments and 
privations which would expel the vital principle from any crea- 
ture in existence except themselves. Their hfe is not so con- 
centrated in the brain, which with them is extremely minute, 
but seems more expanded over the whole of their nervous sys- 
tem: take out their brain or their heart, and cut off their head, 
yet they can still move, and the heart will even beat many 
hours after extraction ; it is also stated that they can live with- 
out food for months, and even years.* 

But though gifted by their Creator with such a tenacity of 
life, yet is that life often raised a very few degrees above death. 
Many of them select for their retreats damp and gloomy cav- 
erns and vaults, shut out from the access of the light and air. 
In allusion to this circumstance, Babylon, the imperial city, 
she, who in ancient times subjected the eastern world to her 

1 The Chelonians. 

2 The Gecko, Monitor, Chamailcon, &c. amongst the Saurians. 

3 Job, xli. 34; Psl xxvii. 1 ; Ezek. xxv. 3; Rev. xx. 2, xvi. 13. 

4 Cuv. Rhgn. An. ii. 1. 8. Laccp. Quad. Ovipar. i. 20. 



REPTILES. 407 

domination, was forewarned that she should become heaps, and 

a dwelling-place for dragons.* 

Whether the mau}^ instances that have been recorded in 
different countries, of toads found incarcerated alive in blocks 
of stone or marble, or in trunks of trees, are all to be accounted 
for by supposing a want of accurate observation of the con- 
comitant circumstances in those that witnessed their discovery, 
I will not take upon me to say ; but they are so numerous, as 
to leave some doubt upon the mind whether some of these 
creatures may not have been accidentally interred alive, as it 
were, when in a torpid state, and continued so, till, their grave 
being opened, and the air admitted to their lungs again, their 
vital functions have been resumed, to the astonishment of those 
who witnessed the seeming miracle. Though so given to 
withdraw themselves into dark and dismal retreats, yet many 
of them are fond also of basking in the sun-beam, particularly 
the serpents and the lizards. 

Zoologists seem not even yet fully to have made up their 
minds with regard to the classification of Reptiles. Linne 
placed them in the same Class^ with the Cartilaginous Fishes, 
of which they form his first and second Orders ; but subsequent 
zoologists, with great propriety, have generally considered them 
as forming a Class by themselves, under their primeval name 
of Reptiles. This Class M. Brongniart divided into four Or- 
ders, viz. Chelonians, Saurians, Ophidians, and Batrachians : 
and Baron Cuvier has followed this arrangement in his R^gne 
Animal. Latreille, adopting the Group, has divided it into two 
Classes, Reptiles and Jlmphihians. The Reptiles he considers 
as forming two Sub-classeSy viz. Cataphracta, containing the 
Chelonians, and Crocodiles, and Squamosa, containing the re- 
maining Saurians and the Ophidians. His second Class, the 
Amphibians, consisting of the Batrachians of Brongniart, with 
the addition of the Proteus, Siren, &c. he divides into two 
Tribes, viz. Caducibranchia, or the proper Batrachians, and Pe- 
rennibranchia, or the Proteus, Siren, Axolot, &c. This classifi- 
cation is adopted by Dr Grant, ^ except that he does not sub- 
divide the Reptiles into two Sub-classes ; and Latreille's two 
Tribes of Amphibians he properly denominates Orders. 

That Reptiles, in the larger sense of the term, form a na- 
tural Group, will be generally admitted, when it is considered 
that the salamanders, or naked efts, evidently connect the Ba- 
trachians with the Saurians, and were formerly considered as 

1 Jercm. li. 37. 2 Amphibia. 

3 Outlines of a Course of Lectures , &c. 14 — 16. 



408 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

a kind of lizard ; it seems to me therefore more consistent with 
nature to consider the Reptiles as forming a single Class. 

This opinion has received strong confirmation from a cir- 
cumstance communicated to me by my kind friend Mr Owen, 
well known as one of our most eminent comparative anatomists. 
In a letter received from him, since I wrote the preceding para- 
graph, in reply to some queries I had addressed to him, he 
says, — " 1 lose no time in replying to your very welcome let- 
ter, because I have a statement to make which justifies your 
disinclination to regard the Reptilia of Cuvier as including two 
distinct Classes. Not any of the Batrachia have a single auri- 
cle ; for though the venous division of the heart has a simple 
exterior, it is in reality divided internally into two separate 
auricles, receiving respectively, the one, the carbonized blood 
of the general system, the other and smaller, the aerated, or 
vital, blood from the lungs. This I have found to be the case 
successively in the frog and toad, the salamader and newt, 
and lastly, in the lowest of the true Amphibia, the Siren lacer- 
Una, which in its persistent external branchise comes nearest, I 
apprehend, to the Fishes." 

By this statement it appears that those characters, which 
have been deemed sufficient to warrant the division of the 
Reptiles into two distinct Classes, exist only in appearance. 
1 shall consider them therefore as forming only one, of which 
the following seem to constitute the principal diagnostics. 



Reptilia. (Reptiles.) 

Animal, vertebrated, oviparous, or ovoviviparous. Eggs, 
hatched without incubation. 

Heart, really biauriculate, though in some the auricles are 
not externally divided. Blood, red, partially oxygenated, cold. 

Brain, very small ; vitality, in some degree, independent of 
ii. 

Integument, various. 

As tlie two Orders into which the Batrachians of Cuvier are 
divided by Dr Grant, differ from the rest of the Class not only 
in their respiratory organs, but also in other important particu- 
lars, indicating that they form a group of greater value than 
tlie other three Cuverian Orders, I shall therefore consider the 
Class of Reptiles as further divided into two Snb-classes, which 
I propose to denominate, from the difference of their integu- 
ment, Malacodcrma and Scleroderma. 

Sub-class I . — Reptilia Malacoderma. (Soft-coated Reptiles.) 



REPTILES. 409 

Heart, with two auricles, externally simple, but internally di- 
vided. Integument, soft, naked. Eggs, impregnated, after ex- 
trusion. 

This Sub-class consists of the two Orders called, by Latreille 
and Dr Grant, as above stated, Caducibranchia and Perenni- 
branchia ; but considering* the Reptiles as forming a single 
Class, for the sake of concinnily of nomenclature, I think it 
would be better to restore to the first their old name of Batra- 
chians; and, as the animals that form the second, as Cuvier 
observes, are the only true Amphibians,'^ to distinguish them by 
the name that strictly belongs to them alone. 

Sub-class 2. — Reptilia Scleroderma. (Hard-coated Reptiles.) 
Heart, with two auricles. Integument, hard, often scaly. Eggs, 
impregnated before extrusion. 

Orders. 

Sub-class 1. Sub-class 2. 

1. Amphibians. 3. Ophidians. 

2. Batrachians. 4. Saurians. 

5. Chelonians. 

Order 1. — Amphibians. (Siren, Proteus, Axolot, &c.) 

Respiration, double, by gills in the water, and by pulmonary 
sacs in the air. Gills, permanent. Legs, 2 — 4. 

Order 2. — Batrachians. (Amphiuma, Triton or Water-newt, 
Salamander, Toad, Frog, &c.) 

Respiration, at first by gills, and afterwards by lungs. Gills, 
temporary. Ribs, rudimental. Legs, four. Undergoes a me- 
tamorphosis. 



Order 3. — Ophidians. (Snakes and Serpents.) 

Body, covered with scales, without legs. Ribs, movable. 
Mouth, armed with teeth. Cast their skin. 

Order 4. — Saurians. (Two-footed and four-footed Lizards, 
of various kinds ; Crocodiles, Alligators, &c.) 

Body, covered with scales, or scaly grains, terminating in a 
tail. Ribs, movable ; mouth, armed with teeth. Legs, 2 — 4. 

Order 5. — Chelonians. (Turtles txnd Tortoises.) 

Body, protected above by a carapace, or shield, formed by 
the ribs, and below by a plastron, or dilated sternum. Mouth, 
without teeth. Mandibles, rosinfovm. Legs or paddles, four. 

Though the Malacoderm, or soft-coated Reptiles, appear the 

1 Regne Anim. ii. 117. 



410 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

legitimate successors of the Fishes, yel there are some others 
ill the higher Orders that seem to lead off towards them also, 
for the Ophidians and *Rpod fishes evidently tend towards each 
other. The CoeciZia, or blind serpent, too, is almost uniauricu- 
late, and has only some transverse rows of scales between the 
wrinkles of its skin."^ 

From this statement, ii seems that the Class of Reptiles is 
connected with the Fishes, not by those at the top of tlie lat- 
ter Cl^ss, but by those at its base ; with the Osseans by the 
Apods, and with the Cartilagineans by the Cyclostomes ; so 
that they may be almost regarded as forming a parallel line 
with them, instead of succeeding them in the same series. 
Even the proper Batrachians seem to tend to the Chelonians, 
while the Salamanders look to the Saurians. 

The great body of the Class are predaceous, subsisting upon 
various small animals, especially insects, and some Ophidians 
upon large ones; but the Chelonians seem principally to derive 
their nutriment from marine and other vegetables, though some 
of these will devour Molluscans, worms, and small reptiles: 
the Trionyx ferox will attack and master even aquatic birds. 
Cuvier says, after Catesby, that the common Iguana subsists 
upon fruit, grain, and leaves. Bosc states that it lives princi- 
pally upon insects; and that it often descends from the trees after 
earth-worms and small reptiles, which it swallow^s whole.^ 

Order 1. — The Sirens or Mud-iguana, occupies the first place 
in this Order, and seems to connect w^ith the Apod and Cyclos- 
tomous Fishes, from which it is distinguished by its gills in 
three tufts, and by having only one pair of legs. It appears 
to be an animal useful to man, since it is stated to frequent 
marshes, in Carolina, in which rice is cultivated, where it sub- 
sists upon earth-worms, insects, and other similar noxious crea- 
tures. 

But of all the animals which God hath created to work his 
will, as far as they are known to us, none is more remarkable, 
both for its situation and many of its characters, than one to 
which I have before adverted,^ as affording some proof, that the 
ivaters under the earth, and other subterranean cavities, may 
have their pecuUar population. The animal I allude to is the 
Proteus, belonging to the present Order, which was first found 
thrown up by subterranean waters in Carniola, as w^e are in- 
formed by the late Sir H. Davy,* by Baron Zois. Sir Hum- 

1 Regne Anim. ii. 99. 2 Rlgn. ./3n. ii 44. JV. D. D'H. JV. xvi. 113. 
3 See above, p. 19. 4 Consolai. in Trav. 187. 



REPTILES.' 411 

phry himself appears to have found ihem in the Grotto of the 
Madclalena, at Adelsbnrg, several hundred feet below the sur- 
face of the earth ; he also states tiiat they have been found at 
Sittich, thirty miles distant, and he supposes that those found 
in both places might be thrown up by tlie same subterranean 
lake.* In the year 1833 there were two living specimens in 
the museum of the Zoological Society, where I had the plea- 
sure of seeing them ; and from one of them the accurate figure 
at the end of this volume,^ by the kind permission of the So- 
ciety, was taken by Mr C. M. Curtis. 

When we look at these animals, there is something so dif- 
ferent in their general aspect from the tribes to which they are 
most nearly related, that the idea strikes one that we are view- 
ing beings far removed from those that inhabit the surface of 
our globe, and its waters; which, though accidentally visiting 
these upper regions, may be the outset ters of a population still 
further removed from our notice, and dipping deeper into its 
interior. 

The Froieus is about a foot in length, or something more, 
and about an inch in thickness ; the body is cylindrical, taper- 
ing to the tail ; its colour is a pale red ; its skin is transparent 
and slimy, so as easily to elude the grasp. It has four short 
slender legs, the anterior pair placed just behind the head, 
having three, and the posterior pair, which are shorter, and 
placed just before the vent, having only two toes without claws. 
The head terminates in a flat, very obtuse muzzle, somewhat 
resembling the beak of a duck ; its maxillae are armed with 
teeth ; the eyes are extremely minute, and scarcely discernible ; 
they are concealed, and apparently rendered useless by an 
opaque skin ; but as this animal is said to avoid the light, it is 
evident that it produces some effect upon them ; behind the 
head, on each side, is an opening like those of fishes, over 
which are the gills, divided into several branches.' It has, 
besides, an internal pneumatic apparatus, consisting of two 
vesicles, below the heart. The tail ps compressed, furnished 
above and below with a caudal fin, extending to the posterior 
legs. Its legs, from their having no claws, are, it is probable, 
principally useful in walking upon the mud, and by means of 
its caudal fin it can move fike an ell or fish in the water. 
From a small shell-fish being found in the stomach of one, it 
seems to follow that its food, at least in part, consists of Mol- 
luscans inhabiting the same subterranean caves and waters 

1 Consolat. in Trav. 183—188. 2 Plate XIV. Fia. 1. 

3 Plate XIV. Fig. 1, a. 



412 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

with itself, and probably distinct from any of those to which 
the atmosphere has free access. Sometimes, elevating its head 
above the water, it makes a hissing noise louder than could be 
expected from so small an animal. 

Before quitting this subject, I may observe that Baron Hum- 
boldt has given an account of a wonderful eruption of subter- 
ranean fishes, which sometimes takes place from the volcanoe:^ 
of the kingdom of Quito. These fishes are ejected in the inter- 
vals of the igneous eruptions, in such quantities as to occasion 
putrid fevers by the miasmata they produce: they sometimes 
issued from the crater of the valcano, and sometimes from lateral 
clefts, but constantly at the elevation of between two and three 
thousand toises above the level of the sea. In a few hours, 
millions are seen to descend from Cotopaxi, with great masses 
of cold and fresh water. As they do not appear to be disfigured 
or mutilated, they cannot be exposed to the action of great heat. 
Humboldt thought they were identical with fishes that were 
found in the rivulets at the foot of the volcanoes. These fishes 
belong to a genus separated from Silurus.^ 

Order 2. — This Order begins with two genera, the species 
of which have been supposed to breathe by lungs only, no 
traces of gills having yet been discovered in any individual 
belonging to them. Cuvier thinks that they cast them sooner 
than the salamanders. One of these is a large animal,^ being 
more than a yard in length; it w^as discovered by Dr Garden, 
in South Carohna : hke the Proteus, its eyes are covered with 
a thick tunic, and its toes' have no claw^s. The other,^ found 
in New York, comes near the salamanders, and has been called 
by American writers i\\e giant salamander. Both are found in 
fresh-water lakes, and similar places. 

I have mentioned, on a former occasion, a salamander that 
lays her eggs singly on the leaves of Persicaria, which she 
doubles down over them,* and which are kept folded by means 
i of the glue that envelopes the egg. Dr Rusconi, to whom we 
are indebted for this history, observed the whole progress and 
development of this animal, from its embryo state in the egg. 
It is at first opaque, formed of a soft homogeneous substance. 
Almost as soon as it has escaped from its eiwelope, it becomes 
gradually transparent, sq that the successive developments, 
both of its internal and external organs, may be discerned — the 
heart, and its systole and diastole; the stomach, its form and 

1 Pimclodus. Humboldt names tlic species in (juestion P. Cijclofntm. 
Zool 22. 

2 AmphiumamMiis. 7, Mmnporna. 4 Sep above, p. I W. 



REPTILES. 413 

position ; the intestinal canal, which at first extends in a straight 
line, from one end of (he abdomen to tlie other, and then be- 
gins (o undulate, and ends by forming many convohitions : 
next may be seen the liver, the development of which keeps 
pace with that of the stomach and intesiines; and lastly appear 
the lungs, taking their place and form, always filled with air, 
and so transparent that one might believe the animal has on 
each side of the trunk a bubble of air gradually dilating and 
lengthening. When all these organs have acquired the ne- 
cessary development, the spectator beholds in the little creature 
the beginning, as it were, of its animal life. Its former life 
being merely organic, resembling that of a vegetable, but now 
its motions are become the result of its sensations and will.* 

We see in this instance how exactly the rudiments, as it 
were, of the organs of the future animal, are fitted to respond 
to the action of the elements upon (hem, how the germ of every 
organ begins, if I may so speak, to vegetate, and grows till it 
is fully developed, so as to become either a fit instrument of 
the will or of the vital powers, and adapted to carry the crea- 
ture through all its destined operations, and to enable and 
incline it to fulfil all its prescribed functions. These obser- 
vations, and this intei'esting little history, will apply to man 
himself, who, in his embryo state, is the subject of similar 
developments ; and the words of the divine Psalmist are a 
beautiful comment vipon this our embryo life : For thou hast 
possessed my reins : thou hast covered me in my mother^s womb. 
My substance was not hid from, thee, when I was made in secret, 
and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes 
did see my substance yet being imperfect ; and in thy book all my 
members loere written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as 
yet there was none of them. ^ 

The salamander, as is reported, says Aristotle, if it goes 
through fire extinguishes it:^ this is repeated by Pliny, who 
adds, that it extinguishes it like ice. It never appears, he fur- 
ther observes, except in showery weather, and likewise that it 
emits a milky saliva, which is'depilatory.* Salamanders, says 
Bosc, emit from their skin a lubricating white fluid when they 
are annoyed, and if they are put into the fire, it sometimes 
happens that this fluid extinguishes it suflficiently to permit 
their escape ; and again — when one touches the terrestrial 

1 Rusconi, in Edinb. Philos. Journ. ix. 110 — 113, on Salamandra platy- 
cauda. 

2 Ps. cxxxix. 13—16. 3 Hist. An. lib. v. chap. 19. 
4 Hist. JVat. I X. 67. 



414 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

salamander, it causes to transude from ils .-kin a wliiie fluid, 
which it secretes more copiously than its congeners. This kind 
of milk is extremely acrid, and produces a very painful sensa- 
tion upon the tongue. According to Gesner, it is an excellent 
depilatory. It is sometimes spirted out to the distance of sev- 
eral inches, as Latreille has observed, and diffuses a particu- 
larly nauseous scent; it poisons small animals, but does not 
appear to produce serious efTects upon large ones. ^ 

I have introduced these ancient and modern statements to 
show how little they differ, and in confirmation of the truth of 
them I have a remarkable occurrence to relate, which I give 
upon the authority of three ladies who witnessed the fact, and 
upon whose accuracy I can rely. They were residing at New- 
bury, where their cellars were frequented by frogs, and a kind 
of newt, or salamander, of a dull black colour. Several of the 
frogs were caught one day, and put into a pail ; and while the 
ladies were looking at them they were surprised by observing 
the frogs one after another turn themselves on their backs, and 
lie with their legs extended quite stiff and dead. Upon exam- 
ining the pail they found one of these efts, as they called them, 
running round very quickly amongst the frogs, each of which, 
when touched by it, died instantaneously, in the manner above 
stated. They afterw ards regarded these efts, as may be sup- 
posed, with nearly as much horror as they would a rattlesnake ; 
and a few nights afterwards, finding one in the kitchen, it was 
seized with the tongs, and thrown into a good fire which was 
burning in the grate. The reptile, instead of perishing, slipped 
like lightning through the coals, and ran away under the fire- 
place apparently unhurt. The house, in which these animals 
were found, was in a remarkably damp situation. 

If our northern salamanders are gifted with such powerful 
means of offence or defence, we know not how far those powers 
may be sublimed in the species of warmer climates ; and the 
fire-quenching and death-doing properties of the Grecian or 
Roman salamanders may approach nearer to the, supposed, 
fabulous descriptions of Aristotle and Pliny, than modern Her- 
petologists seem willing to believe. 

There appears no small analogy between these properties 
considered as weapons, and means by which these animals 
either secure their prey, consisting of earth-worms, insects, and 
other small game, or disarm and destroy their enemies, and 
those, related in the last chapter, which distinguish the electric 
fishes. 

1 J\: D D'H. JV. XXX. ft8, 59. 



REPTILE?. 415 

Spallanznni, by numerous experimeuts, lias discovered in 
this tribe of animals, the power of reproducing lost or mutilated 
organs; Bonnet and others have confirmed his observations. 
So that it seems proved, if their legs and tail are cut off, and 
even their eyes plucked out, that in a few months they will be 
reproduced ; and even a limb thus renewed, if again cut off, 
will be reproduced again. 

In going upwards from the salamanders, at first sight, we 
feel disposed to proceed next to the other animals of a similar 
form, the lizards and other Saurians, for this way their exter- 
nal form leads us, but their internal organization is nearer that 
of the frogs and toads. Upon these last I shall not dwell : all 
know that they begin life in the water like fishes ; that they 
are at first without legs, or any instrument of motion but a tail, 
which by its undulations from side to side steers the apparently 
disproportioned body to which it is appended, and makes its 
way with rapidity through its native element. Few^ are igno- 
rant that they first acquire a single pair of legs ; and lastly, 
that another pair being also acquired, they leave the water by 
myriads, and appear, without a tail, as four-footed, and, at cer- 
tain times, noisy reptiles. 

Order 3. — The general function of the Ophidians seems con- 
nected with almost the whole animal kingdom. The insects, 
frogs, and other reptiles, several birds and beasts, up as high 
as the ruminant and even the carnivorous tribes, become the 
prey of various species. They act the same part with land 
animals, that their analogues, the eels and other apod and 
cyclostomous fishes do with respect to those of the water. 
Some are analogues of the lion and the tiger, as the Oriental 
Python and the Occidental Boa, which sometimes exceed thirty 
feet in length, and are as thick as a man's body ; while others 
compete w^ith the minor predaceous beasts in the destruction 
they occasion amongst the lesser quadrupeds. But while the 
predaceous quadrupeds, with the exception of the Hyenas leave 
untouched the skeleton of the animals they devour, the Ophi- 
dians swallow the entire animal, flesh and bone and skin, and 
thus completely remove it from the face of nature ; whereas 
the others, where they abound and are unmolested, make their 
domain like a charnel house, and deform the earth with the 
ghastly relics of their cruelty and voracity. 

The mechanism of the mouth of these animals is so con- 
trived by Divine Wisdom, and the pieces that form it so put 
together, as to enable them to twist and distort and dilate it so 
enormously that ihcy can swallow animals biirger than their 



416 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

own bodies.* The vertebise of ihe great Boa are more nume- 
rous than those of other serpents, which gives them a greater 
power of surrounding and stranghng their prey with their 
dreadful voluminous folds, of crushing it, and, with the help 
of their saliva, rendering it fit for deglutition. With their tail, 
likewise, they can lay strong hold of a tree, so as to use it as 
a fulcrum, by which their powers of compression are increased 
and rendered more available where they have to contend with 
the struggles of powerful animals. 

Order 4. — The connection of the Saurians, or the animals 
forming the next Order with the Ophidians, is very intimate. 
Cuvier says that many serpents under the skin have the ves- 
tige of a posterior limb, which in some shows its extremity ex- 
ternally, in the form of a little claw.^ Amongst the lizards is 
one that has only two fore-legs,^ and another that has only two 
hind ones ;* and a third,^ in which the legs are so short and so 
distant, and the body so slender and serpentiform, that they 
resemble a snake with four legs rather than a lizard. 

This Order is divided into numerous genera and sub-genera. 
One of the most celebrated is the Chameleon. I have already- 
noticed some of its peculiarities, and its mode of catching the 
insects that form its food.^ The ancients were of opinion that 
it lived upon air, led by the power it has of swelling itself to 
twice its natural size, by inflating its vast lungs, when its body 
becomes transparent. Cuvier is of opinion that it is the size 
of the lungs of these animals that enables them to change 
their colour, not in order to assume that of the bodies on which 
they happen to be, but to express their wants and passions. 
He supposes that the blood, being constrained to approach the 
skin, more or less, assumes different shades, according to the 
degree of transparency.^ The Rev. L. Guilding, however, 
mentions another genus,^ the species of which, when in search 
of prey, adapt their colour to the green tree or dark brown rock 
on which they lie in ambush.^ As these animals have the 
power of inflation, at least partially, by assuming a degree of 
transparency, they may appear of the colour of the substance 
they are standing upon, a remark wliich may also apply to 
the Chameleon. The object of this may be to conceal them- 
selves from their enemies, as well as from their prey. 



1 Cuv. Jinat. Comp. iii. 90. 2 R^^c Arum. ii. 7 

3 Chirotes. 4 Bipcs. 

5 Seps. See Roget, B. T. i. 448./. 210. 6 Sec above, p. 200. 

7 Rhgne Ardm. ii. 59. 8 Anolis. 

9 Zool. Journ. iv. 165. 



REPTILES. 417 

The Guanas,^ also, are said to change their colour; they are 
remarkable, as well as the Jlnolis, for the kind of goitre in their 
throat, which when irritated or excited they can inflate to a 
large size. These animals, though their flesh is said to be 
unwholesome, in the countries they frequent are highly prized 
for the table, and are often hunted with dogs. Their eggs 
also are in request. 

The Monitors, or safeguards, as the French call some of them, 
deserve notice, because one species^ is said to assist in the 
diminution of the crocodile, since, like the ichneumon, it de- 
vours its eggs, and even the young ones, on which account it 
is supposed to be sculptured on the monuments of the ancient 
Egyptians. This name was given them because they were 
believed to warn people, by hissing, of the approach of the cro- 
codile, or venomous reptiles. 

But the most celebrated of the Saurians, from the earliest 
ages, is the Crocodile : its history, however, is so well known 
that I shall only mention a few circumstances, of less noto- 
riety, connected with it. There has been some difference of 
opinion as to whether the crocodile can move the upper or 
lower jaw. Aristotle observes, all animals move the low^er 
jaw, except the crocodile of the river, for this animal only 
moves the upper.^ Denon says the same.* Lacepede, on the 
contrary, affirms that the lower jaw is the only movable one.* 
I was assured by Mr Cross, when looking at two alligators in 
his menagerie, then at Charing-cross, that they moved both 
their jaws ; and my friend Mr Martin has observed the same 
thing in India. M. Geoffroy St Hilaire and Baron Cuvier 
nearly reconcile the two opinions. The head, says the former, 
moves on the lower jaw like the lid of a snuff-box, that opens 
by a hinge. By this mechanism they can elevate their nos- 
trils above the water, which they do with great rapidity for 
concealment :^ and the latter observes, that the upper jaw 
moves only with the whole head.'' So that the fact seems to 
be that the lower jaw alone has motion independent of the 
head, and the upper one can only move with it : but when we 
consider that the lower one extends beyond the skull, a condyle 
of which acts in an acetabulum of that jaw, we can easily 
comprehend that the upper jaw and head forming one piece, 
may be elevated at any angle, according to the will of the ani- 

1 Igiiana vulgaris. 2 M. nilotictis. 

3 Hist. An. lib. i. c. 11. 4 Voyage, &c. i. 185. 

5 Hist. Ov. 194. 6 An. du Mus. x. 376. 

7 Regn. An. ii. 18. 
3c 



418 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

mai ; aiul ihus the upper one acquires additional power of ac- 
tion in attacking its prey in the water and securing it. 

The nostrils of this animal are at the end of the muzzle, 
and this structure enables it, by causing the upper jaw to 
emerge a little, which, as the crocodile cannot remain under 
water more than ten minutes, enables it to breathe without 
exposing itself to observation. When on shore it turns itself 
to the point from which the wind blows, keeping its mouth 
open. Adanson relates that he once saw in the Senegal more 
than two hundred of these river monsters swimming together, 
with their heads only emerging, and resembling so many 
trees. Were it not for the number of their enemies, great and 
small, their increase would be so rapid that they would drive 
man from the vicinity of the great rivers of the torrid zone. 
The River-horse* attacks them and destroys many — Behe- 
moth against Leviathan, — for though the Leviathan of the 
Psahiiist is clearly a marine animal or monster,^ that of Job^ is 
as clearly the crocodile,* and they are stated to destroy many 
of them ; even the feline race, in some countries, contrive to 
make them their prey. Though the scales that cover their 
back are impervious to a musket ball, those on the belly are 
softer and more easily penetrated ; and here the saw-fish, and 
other voracious fishes, find them vulnerable, and so destroy 
them. The Trionyx, also, a kind of tortoise, devours them as 
soon as hatched. Their eggs are the prey not only of the ich- 
neumon and the lizard, before mentioned, but of many kinds 
of apes ; and aquatic birds also devour them, as well as raaa 
himself. 

The crocodile has no Hps, so that when he walks or swims 
with great calmness, he shows his teeth as if he was in a rage. 
When extreme hunger presses him, he will swallow stones 
and pieces of wood to keep his stomach distended. The heron 
and the pehcan are said to take advantage of the terror which 
the sight of the crocodile produces amongst the fishes — caus- 
ing them to flee on all sides — to seize and devour them : there- 
fore they are frequently seen in his vicinity. 

Order 5. — The Chelonians, as far as at present known, seem 
far removed from the Saurians. The turtles, indeed, in their 
paddles, exhibit an organ which is common to them, and some 
of the fossil Saurians, as the Icthyosaurus and Plesiosaurus. 
Ouvier places the Trionyx next above the crocodiles ; but it 



1 HippopotamiLs. 2 Pd. civ. 2(). 

W Chap. xli. 4 See above, p. 18. 



REPTILES. 419' 

agrees with them only in its fierceness and voracity, and the 
number of its claws. 

The importance of the highest tribe of this Order to seamen 
in long voyages, is universally known and acknowledged, but 
otherwise there is nothing particularly interesting in their his- 
tory, or that of the tortoises. 

A singular circumstance distinguishes the animals of this 
Class, — very few of them have teeth formed for mastication. 
The guana is almost the only one amongst the existing tribes 
that has them. The Chelonians, which seem almost capable 
of living without food, have none. The teeth of the preda- 
ceous tribes are fitted to retain or lacerate their prey, but not 
to masticate it ; so that the function of the great majority ap- 
pears to be the same with that of the Ophidians before men- 
tioned, the complete deglutition of the animals their instinct 
compels them to devour. Insects, which, of all minor animals, 
are the most numerous, and require most to be kept in check, 
form the principal part of the food of a large proportion of them. 
Creatures also that frequent dark and damp places, and that 
take shelter under stones and similar substances, seem to be 
particularly appropriated to them by the will of their Creator. 
Of this description are slugs, earth-worms, and several others : 
these, therefore, they have in charge to keep within due limits. 
And thus, in their doleful retreats and hiding-places, they ful- 
fil each its individual function, instrumental to the general 
welfare. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

Functions and Instincts. Birds. 

We are now arrived at the highest department of the animal 
kingdom, the members of which are not only distinguished by 
a vertebral column, but also by warm red blood, and a more 
ample brain. This department consists of two great Classes, 
viz. those that are oviparous, and do not suckle their young ; 
and those that are viviparous, which suckle their young till 
they are able to provide for themselves. The first of these 
Classes consists of the Birds, and the last of the Quadrupeds, 
Whales and Seals, called from the above circumstance Mam- 
malians. Man, though physically belonging to the latter Class, 
metaphysically considered, is placed far above the whole animal 
kingdom, by being made in the image and after the likeness of 
his Creator, receiving from him immediately a reasonable and 
immortal soul; and entrusted by him with dominion over the 
fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living 
thing that moveth upon the earth. 

Having, in a former chapter, given some account of those 
animals, to which the waters of this globe are assigned as their 
habitation and scene of action, I am now to consider those 
which their Creator has endowed with a power denied to man, 
and most of the Mammalians — that of moving to and fro in the 
air as the fishes do in the water, which, on that account, though 
they move also on the earth, are denominated, in the passage 
just quoted, the fowl of the air. 

The animals of this great Class are rendered particularly 
interesting to man, not only because many of them form a 
portion of his domestic wealth, look to him as their master, and 
vary most agreeably his food ; but because numbers, also, strike 
his senses by the eminent beauty and grace of their forms, the 
brilliancy or variety of the colours of their plumage, and the 
infinite diversity, according to their kinds, of their motions and 
modes of fiight. But of all their endowments, none is more 
striking, and ministers more to his pleasure and delight, than 
their varied song. When the time of the singing birds is come, 
and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land, who can be dead 



BIRDS. 421 

to the goodness which has provided for all such an unbought 
orchestra, tuning the soul not only to joy, but to mutual good- 
will ; reviving all the best and kindliest feelings of our nature, 
and calming, at least for a time, those that harmonize less with 
the scene before us. 

I may here offer a few observations upon the voice of animals, 
especially birds. A distinction is made by physiologists be- 
tween a voice and a sound, and none but those that breathe by 
means of lungs are reckoned to utter a voice; others, whatever 
their respiratory organs, only emit a sound. The voice also is 
from the mouth alone, the sound from of/ier parts of the body.* 
The vocal animals, therefore, are confined to the three last 
classes of vertebrates — the Reptiles, the Birds, and the Mam- 
malians. In most of these, also, the voice partakes, in some 
degree, of the character of speech; it is intended to indicate to 
another the wishes, emotions, or sufferings of the utterer. The 
great organ of the voice is the wind-pipe, or tracheal artery, as 
it is often called, and its parts, which by its bronchial ramifi- 
cations is so intimately connected with the lungs as to form 
part of their substance. 

Birds, of all animals, are best organized with regard to their 
voice. Besides the upper larynx, or throat, which they have 
in common with Mammalians, at the base of their wind-pipe, 
where it divides into two branches, rendering to each lobe of 
the lungs, it has also another larynx, forming a second vocal 
apparatus. This is produced by a contra-ction of the organ 
furnished with muscular fibres, or vocal strings, which by their 
various tensions and relaxations, modify greatly the tones of 
the voice ; ascending also in the tube of the wind-pipe to un- 
dergo another modification at the upper larynx, w^hich, as it 
were, adds the tube of the /lom to that of the reed. Thus, if 
the head of a duck is cut off, it can produce sounds by means 
of its lower throat, if I may so call it, which no quadruped 
could do. Besides this, birds can, more or less, shorten or 
lengthen the tube of their wind-pipe, so as to modify the sounds 
they emit. 

Though the upper larynx, in birds, has no vibratory vocal 
strings, as in the Mammalians, to modify the sounds, these 
modificatians taking place at the lower larynx, still they can 
enlarge or contract it, which may affect the air in its exit, and 
so produce some diversity. 

Besides all this, whoever casts an eye over Dr Latham's and 

1 See Introd. to Ent. Lett xxiv. 



JUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Mr Yarrel's figures of the wind-pipes of various birds,* especi- 
ally wild-fowl, will see that they vary greatly in their relative 
length and volume ; that some are partially dilated, and others 
contracted, with other peculiarities that distinguish individual 
species, especially in male birds. All these, no doubt, modify 
the voice, and, by the will of Him who formed them, cause 
them to utter such sounds, and speak such a language, as are 
required by the circumstances in which they are placed. The 
cawing of the rook, the croaking of the raven, the cooing of 
the dove, the warbling of the nightingale and the other singing 
birds, are all the result of their oganizaiion according to the 
plan and will of that Supreme Intelligence, infinite Love, Wis- 
dom, and Power, which fabricated and fashioned them with 
this view as well as others, to give utterance to sounds that, 
mixed or contrasted, would produce a kind of universal concert, 
delighting the ear by its very discords. 

It is said by a late writer, that the song of the same indivi- 
dual species of birds, in different districts, is differently modi- 
fied. This, I should think, must be occasioned by a difference 
in the temperature, and other circumstances connected with 
the atmosphere. 

Of all animals, birds are most penetrated by the element in 
which they move. Their whole organization is filled with air, 
as the sponge with water. Their lungs, their bones, their 
cellular tissue, their feathers — in a word, almost every indivi- 
dual part, admit it into their interstices.^' Thus giving them 
a degree of specific levity that no other class of animals is en- 
dowed with, which however does not render them the spoit of 
every wind that blows, for, by means of their vigorous wings, 
formed to take strong hold of the air ; of their muscular force, 
the agihty of their movements, and their powers of steerage 
by means of the prow and rudder of their little vessel, their 
head and tail, they can counteract this levity ; and by these 
also, and by their great buoyancy, they can ascend above the 
very clouds, as well as descend to the earth ; they can glide 
motionless through the air, or skim the surface of the w^aters ; 
they can sport, at will, in the vast atmospheric ocean ; they 
can dart forward in a straight hne, or hke the butterfly, fly in 
a zig-zag or undulatory one, and with ease take any new direc- 
tion in their flight that fear or desire may dictate. Enveloped 
in soft and warm plumage, they can face the cold of the high- 
est regions of the air ; and the denser clad aquatic birds can 

1 Linn. Trans, iv. t. ix. — xv. ; xv. t. ix. — xv. ; and xvi. /. xvii. — xxi. 

2 JV. jy. D'Hist. Nat. xxiii. 352. 



BIRDS. 423 

also sail over the bosom of the waiers, or phinge into them, 
without being" wetted by them. All birds, especially those 
last mentioned, have a gland secreting an oily fluid, with 
which they anoint their feathers and repel the moisture. 

There is no part of the history of these animals, in which 
the care of a fatherly Providence is more signally conspicuous 
than their love of their young, and their tender care of them 
till they can shift for themselves. But as I have already 
adverted to this subject,^ and shall hereafter have occasion to 
resume it, I shall now say something on the classification of 
the feathered race. It is singular that two Classes should 
be placed in apposition to each other, seemingly so opposite in 
their character and most of their qualities, as the Reptiles and 
the Birds — the one the most torpid and doleful and hateful of 
animals, symbols of evil demons; the other the most lively and 
active, and beloved of all the creatures that God has made, 
symbols of the angelic host, and calling upon us to look up- 
wards, and seek those joys that are above us. But in spite of 
this apparently striking contrast, still there is a real affinity 
between the Birds and the Reptiles ; and when we recollect 
that demons are fallen angels, we may apprehend why God 
has placed their symbols in the same series. 

Zoologists are not altogether agreed as to which of the Rep- 
tiles come the nearest to the birds : the beak, and some other 
characters of the Chelonians, have been thought to indicate 
that they are entitled to that distinction f and, by his placing 
the latter immediately after the Birds, this appears to be Baron 
Cuvier's opinion. Any one, indeed, that looks either at the 
common,^ or the hawk's bill, turtles,* or a good figure of them,^ 
will see in them a striking resemblance of some sea-bird, espe- 
cially a penguin ; the anterior elongated paddles imitating the 
wings, and the posterior dilated ones the webbed feet of such 
birds. There are other Reptiles, however, that dispute this 
claim with the Chelonians. Amongst the rest is a remarkable 
fossil genus, regarded as extinct, which Cuvier has arranged 
with the dragon of modern Herpetologists, under the name of 
Pterodactyle.^ The carpal and metacarpal bones, and the pha- 
langes of the fourth toe of the anterior leg are excessively elon- 
gated, to which it is conjectured a membrane was attached, 

1 See above, p. 327 — 329. 2 Mac Leay, Hor. Entomol. 263. 

3 T. Mydas. 4 T. Caretta. 

5 JV. Z).Z)'i/.JV. xxxiv.f. R. 8./. 1.2. 

6 Pterodactylus. Ornithocephalus. Soniiu. 



424 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

forming a wing for flighl.. M. Sommering classes this ren:iark- 
able animal with the Mammalians, supposing its affinity to be 
with the Chekopterans, or Bats ; and Dr Wagler considers it as 
forming, with the Echidna and Ornithorhynchus, an osculant 
Class, which he distinguishes by the ancient name of Griffins.^ 
But the wing in its structure appears to approach nearer to 
that of birds, and therefore Blainville seems right in consider- 
ing it as a Saurian genus leading to them.^ Professor Gold- 
fuss, in his description of a new species,^ mentions having 
found upon it some impressions, looking like those of feathers ; 
and though he thinks it flies like a bird, seems to regard it as 
between the crocodile and the monitor. The serrated beak of 
the mergansers is not very unlike that of the common ptero- 
dactyle,* though that of the species described by Professor 
Goldfuss has a few very long dispersed teeth, of different 
lengths, like those of the crocodile.^ The animals of the last 
named genus, in the structure of their heart, approximate 
most nearly to birds, and in their general organization are at 
the head of the Class of Reptiles.^ 

From these statements, it seems as if the Class just men- 
tioned sent forth several branches towards the Birds ; but, all 
circumstances considered, the pterodactyle, especially if it has 
feathers, or rather plumiform scales, appears to come the 
nearest to them, and to prove that the feathers of the Bird are 
a transition from the scales of the Reptile. 



AvES. (Birds.) 

Animal, vertebrated, oviparous, biped. 

Anterior extremities, organized for flight. 

Integument, plumose. 

Eggs, usually hatched by incubation. 

Lungs, fixed. 

Respiration and circulation, double. ^ 

Blood, red, warm. 

Ornithologists appear at present undecided as to the division 

1 Gryphi. Gray's Synops. Kept. 78. 

2 JV. D. D'H. JV. xxviii. 226. 

3 PL cra^sirostris. his Heft. v. 553. 4 Pt. antiquus. 

5 Isis. ubi supr. t. vi.f. vii. 

6 For tliese observations, with respect to the crocodile, 1 ani indebted to 
Mr Owen. 



BIRDS. 425 

of this great and interesting Class into Orders, as the following 
sjmoptical table of systems, differing in this respect, will show: 

Nitzsch and Schoepss have only . . . . 3" 

Vieillot, Vigors, Mac Leay and Swainson . . 5 

Linne, Cuvier, Dumeril and Cams ... 6 

Illiger 7 

Scopoli, Latham, Myers and Wolf . . 9 l r^ j 

Temminck 13 ^ Uraets. 

Grant 16 

Schoeffer 17 

Brisson 28 

Lacepede 38 

One may truly say here, "the choice perplexes;" and (he 
young Ornithologist must be puzzled to determine which of these 
systems he ought to adopt, especially since the several authors 
of them were amongst the most eminent zoologists of their time. 

I am indebted to Mr Owen for my knowledge of the first 
of these systems, of which, as at present it is little known in 
this country, I will here give an abstract, without entering into 
its merits, except that its primary sections, or Orders, form a 
very natural division of the Class. 



Orders. — I. Aerial Birds. Luftvogeln. 

Sub-Orders. — A. Accipitrines. 
B. Passerines. 









C. 


Pies. 


II. 


Terrestrial Birds. Erdvogeln. 

A. Columbines. 

B. Gallinaceans 

C. Coursers. 


II. 


Aquatic 


Birds. 


Wasservogeln. 

A. Waders. 

B. Anserines. 



In this last Order he includes the Bustards,* which surely 
ought to form a separate Sub-order. 

On the present occasion I shall follow the system of Linne, 
as improved by Baron Cuvier, in the last edition of his Rhgne 
Animal, adopting from Illiger his Order of Cursores, or runners, 
which appears to be osculant between the gallinaceous Order 
and that of the waders. 

That the series ought to begin with the web-footed Birds, as 
approaching nearest to the Reptiles, there is no doubt; but 
which should terminate it, seems not satisfactorily determined. 
The birds of prey appear naturally to connect with the beasts of 
prey, rather than with the Cetaceans, next before which Cuvier 
has placed them ; Carusends I he series with the Gallinaceans, 

I Otis 

3d 



426 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS, 

which Linne contrasts w\lh the Ruminants, and Mr W. S. Mac 
Leay connects with the Gnawers/ and IlUger and Lacepedeend 
with the Psittaceans, which are analogues of the Quadrumanes, 
but these are probabl}^ mostly analogous forms ; there seems 
a more strict affiniiy between the web-footed birds and the 
MonotremeSj the Ornithorhynchus, Echidna, &c. which, in some 
respects, appear to form an osculant Order, between the birds 
and the beasts. In fact the Birds, though united into one 
group with the Beasts by common characters, may be regarded 
as forming a parallel series with the latter rather than a con- 
tinuous one, several of the members of which, respectively, 
represent each other, both as to many of their external features, 
and their functions. Branches, like those of a tree, seem in- 
deed to issue from every natural series, whether vegetable or 
animal, on all sides, and to run in all directions towards those 
of other series, so as to form together a perplexing labyrinth, to 
thread which, although in many places there appears an evi- 
dent clue, in others it becomes evanescent, and the investigator 
of nature seems lost. But when we reflect that the Author of 
Nature is infinite in his essence and attributes, we must expect 
there will be something that indicates their origin from such a 
Being ; though not a real, there will be in them a seeming in- 
finity to finite minds. He who made them sees them all at 
once, and in their several places, and traces simultaneously 
every series through all its numberless divarications or convo- 
lutions; whereas man sees only a part of the ways of his Crea- 
tor. He can have no simultaneous view of things, and must 
be contented with adding, here a little and there a little, to his 
stores of knowledge. To investigate the works of his Creator 
is a laudable exercise of his powers, and to aim as much as 
possible to discover the system of things that the God of Nature 
has est^iblished by his Wisdom, and upholds by his Power, is to 
aimatthediscoveryof Truth ; who will more and more reveal her- 
self to those that, using the proper means, seek her in sincerity. 



Orders.^ 




1. Swimmers. 5. 

2. Waders. 6. 

3. Coursers. 7. 

4. Scratchers. 


Climhcrs. 
Perchers. 
Raveners. 


1 Rodcntla. 




2 Tlie Latin names oftlie Orders are,— 

1. JVatatores. 5. 

2. Grallatorcs. 6. 

3. Cursores. 7. 

4. Rasorcs. 


Scavsorcs. 
fnsessores 
Rapt ores' 


" Raptor miloiui:. Plm'dr 





BIRDS. 427 

Order 1. — Sioimmers. {Web-footed, or ^f^q^ialic Birds. Th:<3 
Order includes the Inertes, Palmipedes, and Plnnatipedes of Di' 
Gram's catalogue.) 

Body, closely covered with feathers, and coaled with a thick 
down next the skin. Legs, placed behind the equilibrium. 
Toes, united by membrane for swimming; membrane sometimes 
divided. 

Order 2. — Waders. {Flamingo, Coot, Avocet, Woodcock, 
Snipe, Ibis, Spoonbill, Jabiru, Bittern, Heron, Crane, Stork, 
Oyster-catcher, Plover, Bustard. — Grallaiores. Grant.) 

Legs consisting of very long tarsi, with the apex of the tibia 
bare; stretched out in flight. Wings, long. 

Order 3. — Coursers. {Apteryx, Ostrich, Emeu, Cassowary, 
Dodo, &c. — Cursores. Grant.) 

Wings, very short, not used for flying. Legs, robust. Toes, 
3 — 4. Beak, depressed or compressed. 

Order 4. — Scratchers. {Pigeon, Quail, Partridge, Common 
Poultry, Guinea-fowl, Pheasant, Turkey, Peacock, &c. — Jllectori- 
des, GallincR, and Columbcz. Grant.) 

Upper mandible, vaulted; nostrils, pierced in a membranous 
space at their base, covered by a cartilaginous scale. Tail- 
feathers, 14 — 18. 

Order 5. — Climbers. {Psittaceans, Toucan, Cuckoo, Wry- 
neck, Woodpecker, &c. — Chelidones, Alcyones, Anisodactyli, Zy- 
godactyli. Grant.) 

Feet with two toes before and two behind. 

Order 6. — Perchers. {King-fisher, Hoopoe, Humming-bird, 
Tree-creeper J Jfut-hatch, Bird of Par adise,Crow, Magpie, Starling, 
Cross-beak, Gross-beak, Gold-finch, Linnet, Sparrow, Titmouse, 
Lark, Goat-sucker, Swallow, Taylor-bird, Nightingale, Red- 
breast, Fly-catcher, Black-bird, Chatterer, Butcher-bird, &c. — 
Granivoroe, Insectivoroe, and Omnivorcz. Grant.) 

Toes four: formed for prehension in nidification. External 
toe united at the base to the internal. Three toes before and 
one behind. All other characters negative. 

Order 7. — Haveners. (Owl, Secretary-bird, Buzzard, Kite, 
Sparrow-hawk, Falcon, Harpy, Eagle, Vulture, &c. — Rapaces. 
Grant.) 

Beak robust, upper mandible, on each side, armed with a 
tooth. Legs short, robust. Toes armed with crooked claws. 

Order 1. — The swimmers, or web-footed birds, form a very 
important part of the feathered race, both as furnishing man 
with food, and as ministering greatly to his comfort, by their 
down and feathers, when he retires to rest; and also by their 



428 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

action upon the inhabitants of the waters both of the sea and 
rivers, which form the principal part of their food. Cuvier 
remarks, that these are the only birds in which the neck ex- 
ceeds, and sometimes considerably, the length of the legs. 
Swimming on the surface, they can thus dip deeper to seize 
their prey. The same remark may be extended to the Sau- 
rians, in which, though the majority have a short neck, one 
fossil animal,* which appears to be the analogue of the swan, 
has a very long one. Other birds, as well as those of the pre- 
sent Order, are distinguished by the length of the neck; as the 
peacock, the turkey, and several other GaUinaceans, and the 
Ostrich and its congeners are still more remarkable in that 
respect. This structure is probably as useful to them as to 
the web-footed birds, in enabling them to secure articles of 
food that would otherwise be out of their reach. 

The birds at the foot of this Order, and indeed of the whole 
Class, are the short-winged swimmers^ particularly the auk^ and 
thepen^itm;^ the one having its station in the northern, and 
the other in the southern seas, reaching to the antartic circle. 
The northern one, the auk, seems to rank above the penguin, 
for its wings have those feathers which, from their office being 
to propel birds when they fly, are denominated rowing feathers,* 
and they can flutter and flap their wings, while \\\q penguins 
have none of these feathers, and cannot use their, so called, 
wings as such. The legs of the auk, also, are not placed quite 
so near the tail as in the southern bird, in which they are close 
to it, though both stand nearly in a vertical position. But 
though of no apparent use as wings, their short anterior appen- 
dages that go by that name, are not given them by their Cre- 
ator merely for show, for when under water they use them as 
fins ; and when it is recollected that Captain Beechy found 
them between three and four hundred miles from any land,* 
they seem to have occasion for additional rowing organs. One 
traveller, D. Pages, says that they also sometimes use their 
wings as fore-legs, walking on all fours." Some of them bur- 
row like rabbits, but how they effect this has not been ascer- 
tained. In general they are reckoned as the most stupid and 
foolish animals in the whole Class: in fact most of the web- 
footed birds exhibit less of the life and spirit and gaiety that 
distinguish so conspicuously those whose principal theatre of 
motion is the air: belonging as they do to two elements, they 



1 PlesiosauruB dolichodeirus . 


2 Mca. 


3 Jiptenodijtes. 


4 Rcmigcs. 


5 Voyage, i. 16. 


6 N. D. D'H. A", xiii. 'JOi 



BIRDS. 42^ 

may be regarded, in some sense, as half fowl and half fish; 
and when we call a man, not remarkable for sense, a goosey 
we admit some such degradation in aquatic birds. 

But all sea-birds are not of this character; amongst these 
the frigate-bird^ and the albatross^ are most conspicuous, emu- 
lating the eagle and the vulture amongst the terrestrial birds 
of prey. Of all the oceanic birds, the frigate-bird comes nearest 
to the eagle. Its keen sight, its crooked beak, its short, robust^ 
and plumy legs, its sharp claws, the vast extent of its wings, 
and its rapid flight, all show that it is the oceanic representa- 
tive of the king of birds. If the peaceful flying-fish seeks a 
refuge from the dorados^ and bonitos,* its aquatic enemies, by 
elevating itself from the water into the air, the frigate-bird 
darts upon it like a thunder-bolt and devours it. If the booby*^ 
has caught a fish, like the bald eagle^ the frigate-bird often 
compels it to let go its prey, and seizes it before it reaches the 
water. Its extent of flight is wonderful, and exceeds that of 
any other marine bird; for it possesses between the tropics a 
domain of more than four hundred leagues, over which it 
directs its course by day and by night ; for, as the plumage of 
the under side of its body is not impervious to the water, it 
cannot continue long upon it, but prefers to brave the wind and 
the tempest, and to elevate itself above the storm, and for re- 
pose retires to lofty rocks and woody islets. 

The albatross is the analogue of the vulture, and the largest 
of the sea-birds, and his wings expand sometimes to the extent 
of twenty feet ; like his prototype, he is occasionally so gorged 
with food as to lose the power of flying, and when pursued, 
his only resource is to disgorge his overloaded stomach. Mr 
Bennet has given a very interesting account of the mode of 
flight of this bird, to which I must refer the reader.^ 

I observed, in the last chapter, that one of the short-winged 
family of this Order, the merganser, appears to be connected 
with the Saurians by its serrated beak; but the penguins, which 
are at the foot of the same Family and of the Order, seem con- 
nected with the Chelonians, their rudimental wings and their 
legs approaching the paddles and webbed feet of the turtles 
and some of the tortoises. Their plumage, when not analyzed, 
resembles very much the fur of a seal, or some quadruped. 

1 Tachypetes Aquila. 2 Diomedea exulans, 

3 Coryphcsna hippurus. 4 Scomber Pelamis. 

5 Sula Bassana. 

6 Richardson, Fn. Boreal. Americ. ii. 15. Audubon. Biogr. 162. 

7 Wanderings, &c. i. 45 — 47. 



430 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Order 2. — I have already noticed several circumstances re- 
lative to the birds of this Order ;^ I shall not, therefore, in this 
place, enlarge much upon them. Their general function is 
not only to devour the smaller fishes, aquatic Moiluscans, and 
other animals, as well as their spawn, that inhabit the waters 
of the globe, whether salt or fresh, but also those that are found 
in their vicinity, as worms, small reptiles, and insects in their 
different states ; and their form is particularly adapted to their 
function : very long legs and toes ; naked knees ; a long sharp 
beak ; where they have to dip under water for their food a long 
neck ; and as, on account of their great length, they could not 
conveniently double their legs in flight, their tail is usually 
extremely short, so as to permit the legs to be stretched out, 
and act in some degree as steering organs. The body of these 
birds, generally speaking, in shape, seems to approach that of 
the Scratchers, but is rather longer, and not so plump. The 
form of some of them is very elegant and graceful ; the plum- 
age of others, especially of some of the scolopaceous tribe, is 
beautifully mottled, but, generally speaking, their colours are 
not brilliant. 

There is one bird^ of this Order that is particularly interest- 
ing, not only on account of some singularities in its structure, 
but likewise for its amiable manners : this bird is described and 
figured by Piso^ under the name of Anhyma, but it is more 
commonly known by that of Kamichi. It is said to be larger 
than the peacock or even the swan. Its wings are armed 
with two strong spurs, which point outwards when the wing 
is folded ; but its most remarkable feature is the long, slender, 
cylindrical, and nearly straight horn which arms its forehead. 
One would suppose a bird so fitted for combats was the terror 
of the feathered race, delighting in battle and bloodshed, 
but this is not the case, for it is one of the most gentle and 
susceptible of birds. It feeds upon grass, and attacks no birds 
that approach it : at the time of pairing, however, the males 
contend fiercely and sometimes fatally for the females ; but the 
victory gained, they become patterns of conjugal fidelity, never 
parting, and like the turtle, if one outlives the other, the sur- 
vivor usually is the victim of its grief.* 

Another South American bird of this Order,^ if we may cre- 
dit the accounts that are given of it, is gifted by its Creator 
with an instinct still more wonderful ; it seems to have a natu- 

1 See above, pp. 283, 292. 2 Palamedea comuta 

3 Hist. JVat. et Med. Ind. Ckcid. 91. 

4 Sonnini, in N. 1). D'J]. JV. xvii. 21. ii Psophia crepitans 



BIRDS. 431 

ral iiiciiiiaiion for the society of man, and seems to occupy the 
same place amongst birds that tlie dog does amongst quadru- 
peds. When taken and fed in a house, it becomes attached to 
the inmates. Like the dog it knows the voice of its master, 
and will follow or precede him when he goes out, quits him 
with reluctance, and appears delighted when it sees him again. 
Sensible of his caresses, it returns them with every mark of 
affection and gratitude : it seems even jealous of his attentions, 
for it will peck at the legs of those who come too near to him. 
It knows and acknowledges also the friends of the family. It 
sometimes takes a dislike to individuals, and whenever they 
appear, attacks them, and endeavours to drive them away. 
Its courage is equal to that of the dog, for it will attack ani- 
mals bigger and better armed than itself. Sonnini, who re- 
lates the preceding anecdotes from his own observation, was 
also told that in some parts of America, these birds were en- 
trusted with the care of the young poultry, and even of the 
flocks of sheep, which they conducted to and from their pas- 
tures.* 

The common Stork^ seems equally attached to man, and in 
return has generally met with protection from him, and in 
many nations has been accounted a sacred bird that it is a sin 
to kill or molest ; and they are entitled to these immunities not 
only on account of their philanthropic instincts, but likewise 
because they destroy lizards, frogs, serpents, and other noxious 
reptiles, which are a considerable annoyance in low and marshy 
districts. The black Stork^ is of a less social turn, and avoids 
the neighbourhood of man, and frequents soUtary marshes and 
thick woods, where it nidificates on old trees. 

Order 3. — We seem to enter this order — which from the 
swiftness of the few animals that compose it, is called the Or- 
der of Coursers'^ — by one of the most singular birds that is at 
present known ; I mean the Jlpteryx australis of Dr Shaw. As 
far as can be judged from the only known specimen, which 
was brought from New Zealand in 1812, one would think this 
bird osculant between the Waders and the present Order. Its 
legs, indeed, seem those of a gallinaceous bird, with a tend- 
ency, as Mr Yarrel remarks, to the spurs of that tribe,^ but its 
beak is related to that of the Ibis, and the lateral skin of the 
toes is notched as in the Phaleropes. The wings are shorter 
than in any other known bird, quite concealed by the feathers, 
and terminate in a claw ; a circumstance which seems to indi- 

1 N. D. D'H.N.'i.VdQ. 2 Ciconiaalba. 3. C. nigra. 

4 Cursores. 5 See Zool. Trans, i, i. t. x. 74. 



432 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Gate an approximation to some quadruped form. These wings, 
though useless for flight, were doubtless given by its Creator 
to this animal to answer some purpose in its economy, either as 
a weapon or a prehensive organ. With the birds of the Order 
in which it is placed it agrees in its general form and plumage, 
but in stature it falls below them, being of the size of a small 
turkey. It is called by the natives Kivi. 

There is another insular bird, the Dodo, noticed in a former 
chapter,* which though classed with t?iis, to judge from its 
figure seems to connect the Ostrich with the next Order, the 
Scratchers ;^ but if we suppose the Order to form a circle, these 
birds will meet, one still being conterminous to the Order above 
it, and the other to that below it. These two birds have four 
toes. Mr W. S. Mac Leay,^ as well as several other zoolo- 
gists, is of opinion that the Ostrich Family, meaning the typi- 
cal members of it, both in their internal as well as their external 
structure, approach the nearest to Mammalians. Of the Os- 
trich itself it is stated, amongst other characters, that its upper 
eyelid is movable and ciliated, and that its eyes are more like 
the eyes of a man than those of a bird, and they are so set as 
both of them to see the same object at the same time ; that it 
is the only bird that discharges urine,* with many circum- 
stances which I have no room to enumerate. Mr Owen, how- 
ever, whose accuracy as a comparative anatomist can be fully 
relied on, has observed to me, that the urinary bladder, ster- 
num, and some other parts of these birds, are closer approxima- 
tions to the Chelonians than the Mammalians. 

The animal of the latter Class, whose external form ap- 
proaches nearest to the Ostrich is the Camel, a resemblance 
which has been so striking, that from a very early period they 
have been designated by a name which connects them with 
this quadruped :^ in many particular points, besides general 
form, they also resemble it. The substance and form of their 
two-toed feet, a callosity on their breast and at the os pubis, 
their flattened sternum, and their mode of reclining. It is sin- 
gular that these birds associate with beasts, particularly the 
quagga and zebra. ^ 

The new world, which has a representative of the camel in 
the lama, and of the hippopotamus in the tapir, has also a 
peculiar ostrich of its own, which is called the nandu -^ so that in 

1 See above, p. 30. 2 Vigors in Linn. Trans, xiv. 485. 

3 Hor. Ent. 266. Linn. Trans, xvi. 43. 

4 JV. D. D'H. JV. iii. 85, 86. 5 Struthlo-cameluii. 

6 Burchell's Travrls in S. Africa, ii. 315. 

7 Rhea Amcrtcawi . 



BIRDS. 433 

Africa, Asia,* Australia,'' and America, there is a distinct 
genus of the present Order, each, as at present known, consist- 
ing of a single species. 

With respect to ihek functions, not mucli has been observed : 
they are said to live a good deal upon grain, fruit, and other 
vegetable substances, and the nandu is fond of insects ; pro- 
bably others of them may also assist in restraining the inces- 
sant multiplication of these little creatures. The ostrich may 
be said almost to graze, though it is very eager after grain ; 
but its history is too well known to require any further enlarge- 
ment upon it. 

Order 4. — The birds of this Order are called Scratchers, from 
fin action common to many of them, and more particularly ob- 
servable in our common poultry, that of scratching the ground 
to turn up food, especially w^hen followed by their chicks. Of 
all the gifts of Providence, there is none that more promotes 
our comfort and pleasure than the majority of the animals that 
compose this Order, for it includes almost all our barn-door 
fowls, and the great majority of the game pursued so eagerly 
by the sportsman ; birds not only valuable for the variety and 
delicacy of the food, both flesh and eggs, with which they sup- 
ply our tables, but delighting us by the beauty, the elegance, 
and stateliness of their forms ; the diversity of their plumage, 
especially the elongated or expansile tail feathers of the males ; 
and the rich variety and splendour of their colours. The gor- 
geous peacock and the graceful pheasant have scarcely a 
parallel in the other Orders, except perhaps, as to splendour, in 
those brilliant little gems, the humming-birds. 

I have mentioned, on a former occasion,^ the numerous va- 
rieties of the common fowl, which have probably been pro- 
duced by climate and cultivation. With regard to size, Su- 
matra appears to produce both the smallest and the largest 
kind of poultry, the common feather-legged Bantam, and the 
lago fowl,* the cock of which, Marsden says, he has " seen 
peck off a common dining table ; when fatigued, they sit down 
on the first joint of the leg, and are then taller than the com- 
mon breed."^ Colonel Sykes imported them into England in 
1831 ; the hen laid freely, and reared two broods of chickens. 

Wild poultry are found both in the old world and the new : 
the jungle-fowl,' from which our breeds are supposed by Son- 
nerat to have originated, are common in India ; and the Span- 

1 Casuarius geleatus. 2 Dromaius ater. 

3 See above, p. 36. 4 Gallus giganteus. 

5 Sumatra, 2 Ed. 98. 6 Gallus Sonneratii. 

3e 



434 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

iards are said to have found another kind in Peru and Mexico, 
in which last country they were domesticated, and called chi- 
acchialacca; Parmentier states that he heard the crow of the 
cock of this breed in the wildest forests of Guiana, and that he 
had seen one of them/ 

The birds of this order are granivorous, insectivorous, or both, ■ 
and the Hocco is stated to subsist on buds and fruits. Some 
are gregarious, as the pigeons ; while others, as the partridge, 
form coveys only for a time ; in spring those that survive the 
sporting season pair oflf, and are soon at the head of a numerous 
family. 

Order 5. — Baron Cuvier has separated the Climbers from 
Mr Vigor's Order of Perchers, not only on account of their 
having two toes behind, as well as before, but also on account 
of difTerences in their larynx, sternum, and coecal appendages. 
Amongst the Climbers, though there are some armed with 
beaks of very extraordinary forms and magnitude, as the tou- 
can, there are none so interesting and altogether so remarkable 
as the Psittacean Family, or the Parrots, Parroquets, Macaws, 
Cockatoos, &c. They seem complete analogues of the Mon- 
keys and other Quadrumanes, which they exceed, in their 
faculty of learning to articulate many words, for which their 
lower larynx is particularly constructed, and thus mimic the 
utterance of man, as the former animals do his actions; a cir- 
cumstance which seems to have induced some ornithologists to 
place them at the head of their Class,'^ in contrast with the 
latter animals. 

There is a genus, belonging to this Order, found in the 
southern parts of Africa, the species of which are called bee- 
cuckowSf^ and are remarkable for indicating both to the honey- 
ratel* and the Hottentot the subterranean nests of certain bees, 
which they do by a particular cry, morning and evening, and 
by a gradual and slow flight towards the quarter where the 
swarm of bees have taken up their abode ; the beast and the 
man both attend to the notice, seek the spot, and dig up ihe 



1 JV. D. D'H. JV. vii. 472. Modern ornithologists appear to account all 
these breeds as well as those mentioned in a former chapter (See above, p. 36) 
as distinct species. Linne, besides his Phosiajius Galltis a., or tlie common 
breed, has Var. 0, P. G. cristatus, or the Polish breed ; y. P. G. ecaudatxis, or 
the Rumplet ; <r. P. G. Morio, or the black- skinned breed; i. P. G. laiuitns, or 
the silk breed ; ». P. G. crispus, or the Fricsland breed; and ^. P.G. pusillus, 
or the Bantam breed. There are several more in Gmelin. 

2 Illigcr, &c. 3 Indicator major, minor yicill.f&c . 
4 Vivera mcllivora. 



BIRDS. 435 

nest; and to the share of the bird generally falls, not the part 
stored with the/ionet/,but that in which the grubs are contained :* 
so that the bird, though it invites others to partake with it, has 
its own subsistence, which it could not otherwise readily come 
at, principally in view. Both this animal and its companion, 
the ratel, are fitted by Providence for their function, and pro- 
tected from the danger to which they are exposed from the 
stings of the irritated bees by a very hard skin. The bees, 
however, sometimes revenge themselves on the treacherous 
bird by attacking it about the head and eyes, and so destroying 
it.^ It is singular, and affoids a most convincing proof of de- 
sign, that two animals that are so necessary to each other, the 
one to indicate and the other to excavate their common prey, 
should each be defended by the same kind of armour, and each 
seek a different portion of the spoil, suited to its habits. 

Amongst the birds most remarkable for their instincts, in 
the present Order, is the wryneck.^ It is a feathered ant-eater, 
and is organized by its Creator to entrap its prey by the very 
same means as the quadruped ones. Like them, it can pro- 
trude its tongue to a very great length, which is not owing to 
the structure of this organ itself, but to a peculiar ligamentous 
sheath in which it usually is contained. Its salivary glands 
are above an inch long, and shaped somewhat like a tea-spoon. 
The saliva they secrete is so very viscid as to be capable of 
being drawn into threads finer than a hair, and several feet in 
length ; so that when the tongue is besmeared with it, no in- 
sect that touches it can escape. Like its analogues, it darts its 
tongue into an ant-hill, or lays it on an ant-track, and draws 
it back into its mouth laden with prey.* It is singular that the 
functions, in warm chmates, given in charge by Providence to 
quadrupeds, in temperate ones, in this instance, devolves upon 
birds, the rapid increase of ants, in tropical countries, probably 
rendered it necesary that their devourers should be more nu- 
merous, and act with a greater momentum. 

The general functions of this Order, as they are in most of 
those of the present Class, are various. The food of some are 



1 Sparrmann, Voyage, ii, 181, 187. 

2 Cuv. Rkgn. An. i. 455. Sparrmann, Voyage, ii. 182. 

3 Yunx torquilla. 

4 I owe these observations on the wryneck principally to a medical friend, 
George Helsham, Esq. of Woodbridge, in Suffolk, a practical ornithologist, 
not only systematically and anatomically, but knowing birds also in their 
haunts, and conversant with their habits and instincts. 



436 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

roots, fruits, and other vegetable substances ;^ of others the 
grubs of insects;^ of others, again, principally insects in gene- 
ral under every form f and lastly, some to fruits or insects will 
add the eggs and the nestlings of other birds.* 

Order 6. — Tlie birds of this Order, the Perchers, are distin- 
guished from the last, not only by the characters lately no- 
ticed, but likewise by a considerable difference in their habits 
and manners. Amongst them we find all those that delight 
us by their varied song; they are truly birds of the air, for they 
seem to have the full command of that element ; many of them 
moving gaily in every direction that their will suggests, rising 
and falling, flying backwards and forwards, or performing end- 
less evolutions, pro re nata, in their flight. These Perchers also 
are the best nest-builders, not usually selecting, like the Climb- 
ers, the interior of a hollow tree or similar situations, but most 
commonly interweaving their nests between the twigs and 
branches of trees and shrubs, or suspending them from them, or 
even attaching them to humbler vegetables ; some having even 
exercised arts from the creation, which man has found of the 
greatest benefit to him, since he discovered them. These 
birds, indeed, may be called the inventors of the several arts of 
the weaver, the seamstress, and the tailor, whence some of them 
have been denominated weaver and tailor-birds. 

The nest of the httle Indian weaver-bird,^ though it has 
neither warp nor woof, being formed by various convolutions of 
the slender leaves of some grass, so intertwined and entangled 
as to produce a web sufficiently substantial for the protection 
of the inhabitants of the nest, is, nevertheless, a very wonderful 
structure, but as it is well known^ I shall not further enlarge 
upon it, but proceed to the tailor-birds, whose nests are still 
more remarkable. 

India produces several species that are instructed by their 
Creator to sew together leaves for the protection of their eggs 
and nestlings from the voracity of serpents and apes ; they 
generally select those at the end of a branch or twig, and sew 
them with cotton, thread, and fibres. Colonel Sykes has seen 
some in which the thread was Uterally knotted at the end.'' 
The Indian birds of this description form two genera, separated 



1 


The Psittaceans. 








2 


Tlie Pics. 




3 


The CucJcoics. 








4 


The Toucan. 




5 


Ploceus Tcxtor. 














6 


There arc several of those 


nests 


in the 


miisouui of the Zoological 


So- 


ciety 
















7 


Catalogue of birds, 


&c. 10. 













BIRDS. 437 

from Sylvia by Dr Horsfield.* The inside of these nests is 
lined usually with down and cotton. 

But these birds are not confined to India or tropical coun- 
tries ; Italy can boast a species which exercises the same art : 
and I am indebted to the kindness of one of our most eminent 
ornithologists'^ for being enabled to give a figure of this pretty 
and interesting bird, from a specimen in his possession f and 
to the Zoological Society for their permission to have a draw- 
ing made from a nest in their museum.* This little creature 
was originally described and figured by M. Temminck in 1820, 
but its singular instincts, as to its mode of nidification, were 
afterwards given in detail by Professor P. Savi. It is called 
by the Pisans Becca moschinoy and is a species of the genus 
Sylvia.^ 

In summer and autumn it frequents marshes, but in the 
spring it seeks the meadows and cornfields ; in which, at that 
season, the marshes being bare of the sedges which cover them 
in the summer, it is compelled to construct its nest in tussocks 
of grass on the brink of ditches : but the leaves of these, being 
weak, easily split, so that it is difficult for our little seamstress 
to unite them, and so to form the skeleton of her fabric. From 
this and other circumstances the vernal nestsof these birds differ 
so widely from those made in the autumn, that it seems next 
to impossible that both should be the work of the same artisan. 

The latter are constructed in a thick bunch of sedge or reed, 
they are shaped like a pear, being dilated below and narrowed 
above,^ so as to leave an aperture sufficient for the ingress and 
egress of the bird. The greatest horizontal diameter of the 
nest is about two inches and a half, and the vertical is five 
inches or a httle more. 

The most wonderful thing in the construction of these nests 
is the method to which the little bird has recourse to keep the 
living leaves united, of which it is composed. The sole inter- 
weaving, more or less delicate, of homogeneous or heteroge- 
neous substances forms the principal adopted by other birds to 
bind together the parietes of their nests ; but this Sylvia is no 
weaver, for the leaves of the sedges or reeds are united by real 
stitches. In the edge of each leaf she makes, probably with her 
beak, minute apertures, through which she contrives to pass, 
perhaps by means of the same organ, one or more cords formed 
of spider's web, particularly of that of their egg-pouches. 

1 Prima and Orthotomus. 2 Mr Gould. 

3 Plate XV. Fig. 1. 4 Ibid. Fig. 2. 

5 S.cisticola. 6 Plate XV. Fig. 2. 



438 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

These threads are not very long, and are sufficient only to pass 
two or three times from one leaf to another ; they are of un- 
equal thickness, and have knots scattered here and there, 
wliich in some places divide into two or three branches. 

Tliis is the manner in which the exterior of the nest is 
formed ; the interior consists solely of down, chiefly from plants, 
a little spider's web being intermixed, which helps to keep the 
other substances together. In the upper part and sides of the 
nest, the two walls, that is the external and internal, are in 
immediate contact; but in the lower part a greater space in- 
tervenes, filled with the slender foliage of grasses, the florets of 
Syngenesious plants, and other materials which render soft 
and warm the bed in which the eggs are to repose. 

This little bird feeds upon insects. Its flight is not rectili- 
near, but consists of many curves, with their concavity upw^ards. 
These curves equal in number the strokes of the wing, and at 
every stroke its whistle is heard, the intervals of which corres- 
pond with the rapidity of its flight. 

Perhaps of all the instincts of Birds, those connected with 
their nidification are most remarkable ; and of all these, none 
are so wonderful as those of the tribe to which the little bird 
whose proceedings in constructing its nest I have just des- 
cribed, belongs. In the Indian tailor-birds, the object of their 
sutorial art is stated above ; and doubtless, in the case of the 
Italian, the attack of some enemy is prevented by her mode of 
fabricating her nest. Situated so near the ground, her eggs, 
but for this defence, might otherwise become the prey, perhaps, 
of some small quadruped or reptile. He who created the birds 
of the air taught every one its own lesson, and how to place 
and construct its nest as to be most secure from inimical intru- 
sion. I may observe here, that Professor Nitzch's three Orders, 
or rather Sub-classes, mentioned above, receive some confirma- 
tion from the places selected by the individuals composing 
them, to form their nests and deposit their eggs in. The 
aquatic birds generally select places in the vicinity of wafer; the 
terrestrial make them on the ground; and the great body of the 
aerial construct their nests in trees, shrubs, Q.nd plants. 

The birds of this Order as to iheh-food leave no vegetable or 
animal substance untouched, and the humming-birds, with 
their butterfly-tongue, imbibe the nectar of flowers. Of a vast 
number, insects form the principal part of their food, and they 
are the chief check to their too great multiplication ; and 
sometimes, as in the case of the locust-eating thrush,* they 

1 Ttirdus gryllivorus. 



BIRDS. 439 

devote themselves to a particular tribe of insects, but most of 
the insectivorous birds will also eat grain. 

Order 7. — The last Order of Birds, the Ravcners, includes 
those that are most perfect in their form, and all are remark- 
able for their predatory habits. Their power of wing, and 
talon, and beak, distinguish them from all other birds of the 
air; and though some of the terrestrial birds vie with them in 
magnitude, and some of the aquatic ones, as we have seen,* 
exceed them in extent of wing and untired flight, yet none can 
come near them in the union of all those qualities which con- 
stitute their claim to the first rank amongst the birds; and the 
eagle has, as it were, been consecrated king over them all, by 
being placed in the Hol)^ of Holies of the Jewish temple as 
one of the symbols of those powers that rule under God in na- 
ture.^ 

This Order is usually divided into two sections, which might 
be denominated Sub-orders, the nocturnal birds of prey and the 
diurnal. The first of the birds of these sections are distin- 
guished by their large eyes, the enormous pupil of which 
receives so many rays of light, that they are dazzled by the 
glare of day; but by it are enabled to see in the night — they 
fly in the evening and by moonhght. Thus they are fitted 
best to fulfil their function, and to be very beneficial to man, 
in keeping within due hmits animals that are often extremely 
detrimental to his property, and commit iheir ravages more or 
less in the night ; on this account owls are often seen in barns 
where mice and rats abound, and are most valuable auxiliaries 
to the cats. The white owl^ is said to destroy more of the 
murine race than even these last animals. Had not the pro- 
vident care of the Father of the universe created these mouse- 
and-rat-destroying animals, the tiller of the soil would often 
labour in vain. 

The diurnal Section of the Haveners contains all the birds 
of might and power. I have before mentioned the secretary- 
bird,* created to diminish the number of serpents ; so similar to 
some of the waders, as to have been classed with them by sev- 
eral ornithologists ; but Cuvier says, its whole anatomical 
structure, as well as its beak and other external characters, 
vindicate its claim to be placed in the present Order.^ 

Another species belonging to it descends to still lower food, 
and like the bee-eater," devours bees and wasps and other in- 

1 See Introduction. 2 Ezek. i. 10 ; x. 1. 

3 Strix flammea. 4 See above, p. 284. 

5 Rhgnc An. i. 339. 6 Merops apiaster. 



440 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

sects, I allude to the bee-falcon;^ but in general the aquiline race 
attack vertebrated animals, reptiles, fishes, and birds of every 
wing, and many quadrupeds, and the giant vultures satiate 
their ravenous appetites upon any carcasses that their peircing 
sight, from the great heights to which they ascend, can dis- 
cover. Humboldt says, that the Condor'^ soars to the height of 
Chimborazo, an elevation almost six times greater than that 
at which the clouds that overshadow our plains are suspended.* 

In the book of Deuteronomy we have a very animated and 
beautiful allusion to the eagle, and her method of exciting her 
eaglets to attempt their first flight, in that sublime and highly 
mystic composition called Moses' Song ; in which Jehovah's 
care of his people, and methods of instructing them how to 
aim at and attain heavenly objects, is compared to her proceed- 
ings upon that occasion. Jls an eagle stirreth up her nest, jiuU 
tereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, 
beareth them on her wings : so Jehovah alone did lead him. The 
Hebrew lawgiver is speaking of their leaving their eyrie. Sir 
H. Davy had an opportunity of witnessing the proceedings of 
an eagle after they had left it. He thus describes them. 

" I once saw a very interesting sight above one of the crags 
of Ben Nevis, as I was going on the 20th of August in the 
pursuit of black game. Two parent eagles were teaching their 
offspring, two young birds, the manoeuvres of flight. They 
began by rising from the top of a mountain in the eye of the 
sun; it was about mid-day, and bright for this climate. They 
at first made small circles, and the young birds imitated them; 
they paused on their wings, waiting till they had made their 
first flight, and then took a second and larger gyration, always 
rising towards the sun, and enlarging their circle of flight so 
as to make a gradually extending spiral. The young ones 
still slowly followed, apparently flying better as they mounted ; 
and they continued this subUmekindof exercise, always rising, 
till they became mere points in the air, and the young ones 
were lost and afterwards their parents to our aching sight."* 

What an instructive lesson to Christian parents does this 
history read ! how powerfully does it excite them to teach their 
children betiities to look toward heaven and the Sun of righte- 
ousness, and to elevate their thoughts thither more and more 
on the wings of faith and love ; themselves all the while going 
before them, and encouraging them by their own axample. 

1 rtcrnis apivorus. 2 Sarcorhamphns Grijphiis. 

3 Zool. i. 29. See above, p. 272. 4 Salmonia, UU. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

Functions and Instincts. Mammalians. 

We are now arrived at the last and highest Class of the Animal 
Kingdom, to which man himself belongs, and of which he 
forms the summit: but though he may be said to belong to it in 
some respects, in others he stands aloof from it, as an insulated 
animal, and one exalted far above it, being created rather to 
govern its members, than to be the associate of the highest of 
them. 

This Class includes many animals which are of the greatest 
utility to man, and without which he could scarcely exist, at 
least not in comfort; and others again that attack him and his 
property; and though thefearofhim,insomedegree, still remains 
upon them, also often excite that passion in his breast. But 
he of all animals is the only one, that by the exercise of his 
reasoning powers and faculties, can arm himself with facti- 
tious weapons, enabling him to cope with the superior strength, 
the fierceness, claws, and teeth of the tiger or the lion, and to lay 
them dead at his feet when in the very act of springing upon 
him. 

The animals of this Class, that are terrestrial, are all quadru- 
peds,^ and are mostly covered with fur or hair, longer or shorter, 
though in some, these hairs become quills, as in the porcupine, 
or spines, as in the hedgehog ; others, like the serpents and 
and lizards, are protected by scales, as the Manis ; and some 
are incased in a hard coat of armour, often consisting of pieces 
so united as to form a kind of mosaic, as the armadillo, the 
Chlamyphorus,^ and probably the Megatherium. 

In the aquatic Mammalians the legs are, more or less, con- 
verted into fins, or means of natation.^ The whole body con- 
stituting the Class, though sometimes varying in the manner, 
are all distinguished by giving suck to their young, on which 



1 TtrpetTTo^ct TH( ynt. 2 Plate XVII. 

3 See above, p. 256, 265. 

3f 



442 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

account they were denominated by the Swedish naturaHst, 
Mammalians. ^ 

The situation and number of the, usually protuberant, or- 
gans that yield the milk, vary in different tribes and genera. 
The Creator has distributed them according to tlie circum- 
stances of each kind. Physiologists divide them into /jec/ora/, 
or those on the chest ; abdominal^ or those on the abdomen; and 
inguinal, or those on the groin. In the human race, the Quad- 
rumanes, and the bats, and some others, these organs are placed 
between the arms. For an erect animal like man, it is evi- 
dent that this situation for the paps was the only convenient 
one for suckling an infant, either when sitting or standing; 
the monkey tribes also, which are always moving about upon 
trees, and among the branches, could not have exercised this 
maternal function, had their lactescent organs been placed 
lower; and the bats, which carry and suckle their young dur- 
ing flight, required that their nipples should be similarly placed, 
to enable them to keep fast hold. All the species of the above 
tribes have only a pair of the organs in question, with the ex- 
ception of the lory, or sloth-ape,^ so called from the excessive 
slowness of its movements, which has four, two of which Cu- 
vier places in his abdominal column, under the name of epigas- 
tric. 

The animals which produce more than two at a birth, as 
might be expected, have a proportionable number of nipples 
differently distributed. Thus the cat has four pectoral, and 
four abdominal. The ten nipples of the sivine are all abdomi- 
nal, and those of the other Pachyderms, with the exception of 
the elephant, which has only two pectoral nipples, are simi- 
larly situated. The jerboa^ has both pectoral and inguinal 
ones, while the lemming* has all three kinds; the Ruminayits, 
Solipeds, Amphibians, Carnivorous Cetaceans, have only ingui- 
nal dugs, with from two to five nipples. This situation is 
evidently best suited for suckling their limited number of young 
ones. Amongst the Marsupians, whose young, immediately 
upon their birth, pass into a second matrix as it were, almost 
the entire skin of the abdomen forms a pocket, inclosing the 
lactescent organs ; those of the opossum are arranged, in Cu- 
vier's table, in the inguinal column ; but in the KanguroOy 
which has four, they appear rather to be abdominal. These 
variations in the position and number of the organs furnishing 

1 Cuvier calls them Mnmmifcra, but there seems no reason for altering 
the original term. 

2 HtciLops. 3 D'qms Sagiita. 1 Lcinmu^i. 



MAMMALIANS. 443 

the sole food of the animals of the present Class in their state 
of infancy, were evidently planned and formed by the hand of 
a being supreme in Wisdom, Power, and Goodness, who adapted 
every organ to the circumstances in which it was his will 
to place the diversified animals (hat compose it, and to their 
general structure. To those which produce not more than 
two at a birth, only two organs for suction were usually given, 
placed, according to the wants of the animal, either between 
the anterior or posterior extremities, in which latter case the 
posture was never erect ; but where he decreed an animal 
should produce a more numerous progeny, he planted them in 
greater numbers, and so distributed them that all belongitig to 
the same litter could suck at the same time. In the case of 
the Kanguroo the members of two litters are sometim.es sucking 
at the same time, which accounts for their having /owr nipples, 
a fact which shows how accurately every thing has been fore- 
seen, weighed, and numbered, by a Provident Intellect. 

In the whole animal kingdom, except amongst the Mam- 
malians, there is no instance of the young being supported by 
their parents with nutriment derived from themselves, nothing, 
therefore, affords a clearer character for a definition of the Class 
than this most interesting one: the Birds, indeed — with the 
exception of pigeons which feed their nestlings from their crop — 
as well as the bees, and several other Hymenopterous insects, 
provide their progeny with food which they collect for them 
themselves; but the great majority of invertebrated animals, 
confine their care for them, to placing their eggs in a situation 
in which, when hatched, they w^ould meet with their appro- 
priate food, and this appears to be all that is generally done 
by the two first classes of Vertebrates, the Fishes, and the Rep- 
tiles. 



Mammalia. (Beasts.) 

*^nimal vertebra ted, ovoviviparous, or viviparous. 

Extremities ambulatory, or natatory ; in a few organized for 
flight. 

Integument pilose ; sometimes spinose, or armed with hard 
scales or plates ; and sometimes naked. Young not hatched 
by incubation, but when first extruded from the matrix, receiv- 
ing their nutriment by suction, till they can support them- 
selves. 

Circulation double. Blood red, warm. 

Respiration simple. Lungs tlioracic. 



444 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Cuvier seems to have laboured under some difficulty with 
regard to the Classification of Mammalians, and to have regarded 
the Marsupians and Monotremes as forming a distinct Class, 
divisible, for the most part, into Orders analogous to those into 
which the Class of common Quadrupeds is divisible/ Subse- 
quent observations have proved the general correctness of this 
idea. Mr Owen observes to me, in a letter, "Dissections of 
most of the genera of Marsupians have tended to confirm in 
my mind the propriety of establishing them as a distinct and 
parallel group, beginning with the Monotremes^ which I believe 
to lead from Reptiles, not birds. A general simplicity in the 
structure of the brain; a less perfect condition of the vocal or- 
gans ; some peculiar dispositions of the great veins and arteries, 
as the presence of two superior vencB cavx, and the absence of 
an inferior mesenteric artery, are among the circnmstances in 
which they, the Marsupians and Monotremes differ from the 
true viviparous Mammalians, and agree with the oviparous 
Vertebrates. Recent opportunities of examining the impreg- 
nated uterus of the Kanguroo and Ornithorhynchus have almost 
determined that they are both ovoviviparous." 

Under these impressions, confirmed and illustrated by the 
observations of so able a comparative anatomist, I shall consider 
the Class of Mammalians as divisible into two Sub-classes, 
viz. Ovoviviparous Mammalians, and Viviparous Mammalians. 

It may be here observed, with regard to the state of forward- 
ness in which the different tribes of Mammalians leave the 
matrix, a considerable variation takes place, some requiring a 
longer time than others, before they can be considered as at 
all independent of maternal care and protection. The young 
of the Ruminants, Pachyderms, and Solipeds, come into the 
world with the organs of the senses, and of locomotion, in a 
state to be used immediately ; they can see with their eyes, and 
hear with their ears, and tvalk with their legs, as soon as they 
are born ; whereas the Predaceans and several others, when 
first born are blind, and unable to walk, and do not attain to 
the full use of their eyes and legs till a considerable time after 
birth. In man, though the infant is born seeing, yet a much 
longer period, and the instruction of the mother or nurse, are 
required before it can ivalk. 

In the first case here noticed, that of the Ruminants and 
Pachyderms, the young animal requires less care from tiie 
mother. She has little to do besides suckling, and watching 
it in order to protect it if danger threatens. Bui, in the second 

1 Rcgii. Jhi. \. U4. 



MAMMALIANS. 445 

case, she must prepare a kind of nest, not exposed to the light, 
and removed from observation, in which she can attend to her 
young unmolested, till they can see and move about upon 
their legs. Every one knows how attentive feline animals are 
to these circumstances, and the Rodents often excavate bur- 
rows in which they bring forth and suckle their young. The 
Marsupian Mammalians probably are exposed to external cir- 
cumstances, which render it necessary that they should have 
a kind of nidus formed of the skin of their own body, to receive 
their young when they leave the matrix, at which period they 
seem to be in a more helpless state than any of the animals 
last alluded to.* 

From this statement we see that the graminivorous and om- 
nivorous animals, whose food is always at hand, come into the 
world the best prepared for action ; while the carnivorous ones, 
and those that must, if I may so speak, procure their daily 
bread by the sweat of their brows, require to be in some degree 
educated for their function,^ before they can duly exercise it. In 
the instance of the Ornithorhynchus, a burrow,^ seems to sup- 
ply the place of the marsupial pouch, which indicates some 
approach to many of the Rodents. 

Sub-class 1. Ovoviviparous Mamm^iWeins. 

Chorion^ or external membrane of the egg not rendcied vas- 
cular by the extension of the foetal vessels into it. Embryo 
not adhering to the uterus. 

Only one passage out of the body. 

Marsupial bones in all. 

This Sub-class is divided into two Orders, Monotr ernes, and 
Marsupians. 

Order 1. — Monotremes (Ornithorhynchus ; Echidna.) 

No marsupial pouch. Coracoid bones extended to the ster- 
num. Young suckled from a mammary orifice: brought up in 
burrows. Animal predaceous. 

Order 2. — Marsupians (JVombat ; Koala; Kanguroo; Pha- 
langist; Flying and Common Opossum, &c.) 

A marsupial powc/i receiving the young after birth, in which 
they are suckled, by means of nipples. Animal herbivorous, 
predaceous, or carnivorous. 

Sub-class 2. — Viviparous Mammalians. 

Chorion, or external membrane of the egg rendered vascular 
by the extension of the foetal vessels into it. 

Embryo adhering to the uterus. 

1 Owen in Philos. Tr. 1834. 344. 2 See above, p. 327. 

3 Owen, ubi. supr. 564. 



446 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Young when brought forth not received into a pouch ; suckled 
by a nipple. 

This sub-class is divided into eight Orders thus arranged in 
an ascending scale, 

1. Cetaceans. 5. Rodents. 

2. Pachyderms. 6. Predaceans. 

3. Ruminants. 7. Cheiropterdns. 

4. Edentates. 8. Quadrumanes. 

Several of these Orders inay be further divided into Sub- 
orders, as will appear when I come to treat of them. I have 
not adhered to Baron Cuvier's arrangement, in placing the 
Ruminants next to the Cetaceans, for it always appeared to me 
incongruous to place at the foot of the scale, animals on every 
account entitled to rank higlier : and 1 am happy to find my 
opinion backed by Mr. Owen's judgment, which he informs me 
is grounded on anatomical considerations. The Hippopotamus 
appears to us both the proper successor of the Cetaceans. 

Order 1. — Cetaceans. This Order may be divided into two 
Sub-orders, the first consisting of those that form the great 
body of the Order, which are predaceous in their habits; and 
the second of those that are herbivorous. (To the first belong 
the Whales; the Cachalots ; the JSTarwhals ; the Porpoises ; and 
the Dolphins, &c. : and to the second, the Manatee; the Du- 
gong; and Rytina.) 

This Order is principally distinguished from the terrestrial 
Mammalians by having the hind legs converted into a horizon- 
tal (so called) fin moving up and down. They have little or 
no neck, and their anterior extremities are covered with a 
tendinous membrane, which enables the animal to use them 
as fins. 

The Predaceous Cetaceans are distinguished from the Her- 
bivorous by having their mammary organs inguinal, and by their 
fins not being prehensory. 

In the Herbivorous Sub-order, the mammary organs are pec- 
toral, and they can use their anterior extremities, in some de- 
gree, as hands, to carry their young, and in locomotion.* 
They are also armed with tusks, a circumstance which ap- 
pears to connect them with the Morse or Walrus,^ which is 
said, by Cuvier, to be both herbivorous and carnivorous, and 
to differ considerably from the rest of tlie Amphibians. 

Order 2. — PacJiyderms. The external ciiaracters which distin- 
guish the Solipcds from the typical Pachyderms arc so striking, 

1 Sec above, p. 20 1. 2 Trichccus rosmarus 



MAMMALIANS. 447 

that they seem ahnost entitled to be placed in a separate Order. 
I shall, however, consider them as forming a Sub-order. (To 
this Order belong the Hippopotamus; the Tapir; the Swine 
tribe; the Rhinoceros; the Elephant; the Horse; and the ^ss ; 
&c.) The principal characters of this Order, are Feet armed 
with hoofs incapable of prehension. In the typical Pachyderms 
the hoof is divided more or less, but in the Solipeds it is not. 

Order 3. — Ruminants. The Camel tribe seems to form an- 
other Sub-order in the present Sub-class, distinguished by the 
remarkable circumstance, mentioned upon a former occasion, 
that its hoof, though superficially divided, has an entire sole,^ 
and the males have no horns. (This Order includes the 
Camel ; Dromedary; Lama; Giraffe; the Ox, and Sheep tribes; 
the Goats ; the Jlntelopes ; the Deed's ; and the Elk.) The 
principal character of the Order is that which its name indi- 
cates, that the animals belonging to it, chew the cud, that is, 
masticate a second time the food that they swallow, which, 
owing to the structure of their stomachs, they can return to 
the mouth after the first deglutition. 

Order 4. — Edentates. (This order contains the Pangolin ; 
the Jlnt-eaters ; the Armadillos ; Sind the Sloths ; &c.) Their 
distinctive character is to have no fore teeth. 

Order 5. — Rodents. {Guinea-pigs ; Hare and Rabbit ; Porcu- 
pine ; Beaver ; Mouse ; Rat ; Dormouse ; Jerboa ; Marmot ; 
Squirrels ; &c.) The principal character of this order are its 
front or cutting-teeth ; of these there are two in each jaw, sepa- 
rated from the grinders by an interval, so that they can neither 
seize any living prey, or lacerate its flesh ; they cannot even 
cut the aliments which form their subsistence, but they can, 
as it were, file them, and by constant labour, nibbling and 
gnawing, reduce them to fragments proper for deglutition. 
They are connected with the kanguroo, the wombat, and other 
Marsupians, and the beaver exhibits one of the distinctive charac- 
ters of the Monotremes, it has only one passage by which the 
excrements are ejected. 

Order 6. — Predaceans or Zoophagans. Cuvier's subdivisions 
of this Order may be regarded, for the most part, as Sub-orders, 
but there is one tribe included in it by this great man, the 
Cheiropterans, which seems rather to form an Osculant Order, 
between it and the Quadrumanes. (Walrus; Seals; Cat; 
Leopard; Panther; Tiger; Lion; Hymna ; Ichneumon, Civet- 
cat; Fox; Wolf; Dog; Otter; Martin; Weasel; Glutton; 
Bear; Mole; Hedgehog; Shrew; &c.) The animals of this 

1 See above, p. 296. 



448 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

Order have three kinds of teeth^ viz. cutting-teeth, canine teeth, 
and grinders ; their paws are armed with claws ; their muzzle 
is often set with whiskers, usually called smellers ; their mam- 
mary organs are dispersed ; their intestines are less voluminous 
than those of herbivorous animals, a provision, the object of 
which is to prevent the flesh which forms their food from pu- 
trifying, by remaining too long in the body. 

Order 7. — Cheiropterans (Bats; Vampyres ; tind Flying-cats). 
The animals of this Order are distinguished by real organs for 
flight, formed of the skin extended between the legs, as de- 
scribed on a former occasion ;^ their mammary organs, as in the 
Quadrumanes, are pectoral ; they are, in some points, con- 
nected with the flying opossum, flying squirrels, &c. 

Order 8. — Quadrumanes. (Monkeys ; Jlpes ; Baboons ; Oran- 
outans.) The great character that distinguishes this order is, 
a movable thumb on their lower extremities opposed to the fingers, 
so that they can use the carpus, metacarpus, and phalanges of 
both extremities as hands. I have more than once had occa- 
sion to observe,^ that certain tribes in the animal kingdom seem 
occasionally to form centres from which rays diverge towards 
different parts. The quadrumanes aflford another example of 
this disposition in nature : the lory, for instance, looks towards 
the sloths ; the baboon, the Cynocephalus of the ancients, to- 
wards the dogs and bears ; the aye aye, amongst the Rodents, 
also might be taken for a quadrumane,^ and several other in- 
stances occur. 

Sub-class 1. Order 1. — The animals of this Order have puz- 
zled Zoologists to ascertain their place and character. At first 
they were regarded as oviparous instead of mammiferous quad- 
rupeds, and the Ornythorhynchus in particular, was thought to 
be something between bird and beast. The researches of Mr 
Owen have almost proved that the animal just named does 
not leave the womb of its mother as an egg, requiring her in- 
cubation, to complete its birth ; but in the form it is afterwards 
to maintain, in which case it must necessarily derive its sup- 
port from her, by some lactescent organ, traces of which have 
been discovered. Its beak resembling that of a duck, and its 
webbed feet seem to connect it, in some degree, with the first 
Order of the Birds ; but the entire scapular apparatus, the de- 
velopment of the oviduct and uterus in both sides, the absence 
of the ligamentum teres, its four legs, and reptant motions, 
show that it is most nearly connected with the Reptiles. The 

1 See above, p. 272. 2 Sec above, pp. 148, 199, 206. 

3 See above, p. 300. 



MAMMALIANS. 449 

Echidna, by its extensile tongue, its food, and mode of taking 
it, approaches the ant-eaters : it also rolls ilself up like an 
armadillo. The funciions of tlie Order seem to be to keep in 
check the numbers of small animals; (he Echidna, the ants; 
and the Ornithorynclms, which frequents the waters, some 
that are aquatic. But we know very little of their habits and 
history. 

Order 2. — The animals of this Order are partly herbivorous, 
and partly carnivorous. The wombat,^ the koala,^ the kan- 
guroo,^ and other New Holland species, are herbivorous; the 
phalangist* of the Moluccas, lives upon the trees, and devours 
insects as well as fruits. The New Holland opossums^ are 
very voracious, and devour carcasses as well as insects : they 
enter into the houses, where their voracity is very troublesome. 
That most common in America,^ like the fox, attacks poultry 
in the night, and sucks their eggs. It is said to produce often 
sixteen young ones in one litter, which, when first born, do not 
weigh more than a grain each ! though blind and almost shape- 
less, when placed in the pouch they instinctively find the nip- 
ple, and adhere to it till they attain the size of a mouse, which 
does not take place till they are fifty days old, at which period 
they begin to see ; after this they do not wholly leave the 
pouch till they are as big as a rat ! ! This statement is so ex- 
traordinary, that, though apparently believed by Cuvier, on the 
authority of Barton,'' it seems almost incredible. It is strange, 
as the animal seems common in America, that Say, or some 
other Zoologist of that country, has not turned his attention 
to it. 

I have mentioned, on another occasion,^ several particulars 
of the history of the kanguroo and koala, which I need not re- 
peat here. Indeed our knowledge of the history and instincts 
of the Marsupian animals is very limited. Europe produces 
none. New Holland, some of the Asiatic islands, and North 
and South America, are their principal habitations. As the 
young of these animals leave the matrix of their mother at so 
early a period, and when, if they were exposed to the atmos- 
phere, they must inevitably perish, it is evident that some such 
protection, as that with which Providence has furnished them, 
was necessary for the preservation of the race. Doubtless 

1 Phascolomys. 2 Lipurus. 

3 Macropiis. 4 Phalangista orientalis. 

5 Dasyurus. 6 Didelphis Virginiana- 

7 Regn. An. 1. 176. 8 See above, pp. 282, 300. 

3g 



450 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

some wise and beneficial end is answered by the seeming pre- 
mature nativity of these httle creatures. 

The opossums are peculiar to America, and are remarkable 
for having- a greater number of teeth than any other animal, 
amounting in all to fifty; they approach the Quadrumanes, by 
having the thumb of their hind foot opposed to the fingers, 
whence they have been called Pedimanes, but it is not armed 
with £U nail. They are usually stationed on the trees, where, 
they pursue birds and insects, though, like the monkeys, they 
often eat fruit, and by this structure of the hind foot they can 
probably better support themselves on the branches. Many of 
the animals of ihis Order tend also to the Rodents, and others 
to the Predaceans. 

Sub-class 2. Order 1. — At the foot of the present Class are 
found the most gigantic animals with which it has pleased Grod 
to people the globe that we inhabit. 

The destruction, however, at least in the Arctic seas, of these 
animals, is so great, that it has been supposed, they are not 
suffered to live long enough to attain their full dimensions; 
but this has been doubted. Mr Scoresby saw none in those 
seas that exceeded sixty-eight feet in length ; but some are 
said to reach one hundred and twenty feet. I saw one, which 
was exhibited two years ago, in the King's Mews, the length 
of the skeleton of which was more than ninety feet. In the 
Antartic seas, where the cupidity of mercantile enterprise does 
not occasion any great destruction of them, some are said even 
to reach the enormous length of one hundred and sixty feet. 
God has placed these Leviathans* where their enormous bulk 
can have full play, and their enormous appetite be fully sati- 
ated, in the vast and teeming depths of the ocean, where, 
whether they move horizontally, or, by the aid of that powerful 
organ, their forked tail, seek the deep waters, there is space, 
and to spare, even for them. 

The carnivorous, or predaceous Cetaceans may very conve- 
niently be divided into sections by characters which distinguish 
ihe'it maccillary organs ; the common whale,^ and the fin-whale,* 
have their jaws armed with no real teeth, but only furnished 
with transverse plates, formed of what is called whalebone, 
consisting of a fibrous horny substance, suflScient for the mas- 
tication of their, for the most part, gelatinous food, which swarms 
in such infinite myriads in the Arctic and icy seas, that Scpresby 
calculates it would require eighty thousand persons, consiantly 

1 Sec aboTe, p. 41 d. 2 Bal(jcna. 3 Balanopttra. 



MAMMALIANS. 461 

employed from the Creation, to count the number of those ex- 
isting simultaneously. 

Animals of this section are further subdivided into those that 
have, and those that have not a dorsal fin. To the latter sub- 
division belongs the animal commonly distinguished as the 
whale by way of eminence,* and which is the principal object 
of the whale fishery. The senses of seeing and hearing in 
these animals, in the water, are extremely acute ; and their 
eyes are so placed that they can see behind as well as before 
and above them, and for a great distance ; but when the head 
emerges from the water, this activity of sight and hearing 
ceases. 

Their motions in the water are extremely rapid. They will 
sometimes assume a perpendicular position, with their head 
downwards, and rearing aloft their tremendous tail, lash the 
water with terrific violence, like the Indian god, churning the 
sea into foam, and filling the air with vapour. Sometimes by 
the motion of this organ, they produce a thundering noise. 
They will dive to the bottom of the ocean ; and when confined 
in the shallows, these unwieldly monsters will sometimes leap 
out of the water. Their brain, compared with that of man, is 
very small. The weight of the brain of an udult man is often 
four pounds ; that of a whale, nineteen feet long, only three 
pounds and a half ; yet this is large compared with that of 
some other animals. 

The second section of Cetaceans consists of those which have 
teeth only in their upper jaw. To this tribe belongs the sea- 
unicorn, or narwhal,^ distinguished by its long tusk, or tusks, 
for there are sometimes two, extended in a horizontal direction. 

To the third section belong thos6 that have teeth only in their 
lower jdiW : of this description are the spermaceti whales, or 
cachalots,' remarkable for their enormous head, sometimes 
occupying half the length of the body. Their teeth are long, 
and numerous, and all point outwards ; opposite to them, in the 
upper jaw, is an equal number of cavities, in which the ends 
of the teeth are lodged, when the mouth is closed. These 
animals are said to grow sometimes to an enormous length ; 
and to be very cruel and dangerous. 

The fourth and last section of carnivorous Cetaceans consists 
of those that have teeth in both upper and lower jaws. To this 
the porpoise,* the grampus,^ and the long celebrated dolphin^ 

1 Balmna Mysitcetus, 2 Monodon Monoceros. 

3 Pkyseter, 4 Phocmna. 

5 Delphinus Orca. 6 Delphinus Delphis. 



452 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

belong. These animals are more active than the preceding 
Cetaceans, and have a brain of greater volume. The common 
dolphin is gregarious, and remarkable for its frolicsome gam- 
bols, often fortelling a storm, during which they will leap 
entirely out of the water. They pursue and devour the gre- 
garious migratory fishes, and will even eat offal and garbage. 
These animals, in their tooth-armed mouth, often opening 
wide, seem to exliibit some affinity to the aquatic Saurian?, as 
has been remarked with regard to the Cetaceans in generaL^ 

The end for which all these carnivorous Cetaceans were 
brought into existence by the Creator of the universe, was 
evidently to keep within due limits, those animals, inhabitants 
of the northern and southern oceans, which were most given 
to increase, and which, were it not for some such check, might 
multiply to such a degree as would interfere with the general 
welfare. 2 

But the vegetable tenants of the ocean require to be kept 
within due limits, as well as the animal, amongst other crea- 
tures to whom this province is assigned, are some Cetaceans ; 
thus preserving the general analogy observable in the animal 
Kingdom, which, in almost every Order, has its cattle, as well 
as its beasts of prey. Only three genera have been hitherto 
discovered to which this function is assigned, and all of them 
consisting of animals now in existence. 

The Manatees,' belong to this Sub-order, on account of their 
carrying their young with their flappers or fin-like legs, and 
their breasts, probably gave rise to the fable of the sirei), or mer- 
maid. 

One of the most remarkable of the herbivorous Cetaceans, 
is the Dugong,* which is the only animal yet known that grazes 
at the bottom of the sea usually in shallow inlets, which it is 
enabled to accomplish by its power of suspending itself steadily 
in the water, and by having its jaws bent down at an angle, in 
such a manner as to bring ihe mouth into nearly a vertical 
direction, so that it can [ecd upon the sea-weeds much in the 
same manner as a cow does upon the heibage. 

Ruppel, a traveller in Africa, discovered a second species of 
Dugongin the Red Sea; and he is of opinion, that it was tiie 
skin of this animal with which the Jews were commanded to 
cover the tabernacle.^ 



I Soc above, p. 10,17, 2 Soo above, p. 107—10!^. 

3 ManaLus Amcriranus. 4 llaiicorc Diiffotifr. 

5 H. Tahvrnaculum. Sor Kxml. xxvi M. /^rtf/i'^^;'.'? skins in our Trans- 
lation. 



MAMMALIAMS. 453 

Order 2. Whoever compares the genuine Pachyderms with 
the Cetaceans, will find many points in which they resemble 
each oilier. As the latter Order contains the hirgest marine 
animals, so does the former the giants that inliabit the earth. 
With respect to their integument, tiie skin of both is nearly 
naked, except in the case of the swine, ilie daman,* the mam- 
moth, and some others ; a very small eye characterizes all, 
and a short tail ; the blubber of the whale seems to have its 
analogue in the fat that covers the muscles of the swine. One 
of the most remarkable animals of tliis Sub-order, is the fossil 
one, which, on account of its enormous tusks, is named Deino- 
therium.^ It is found in the north of Europe, and specimens of 
its powerful jaws and tusks may be seen in the British Museum. 
From its lower jaw two powerful tusks rise as in the Hippopo- 
tamus, to which Mr Owen regards it as approaching very near, 
and as forming the link that unites the Cetaceans to the 
Pachyderms. The herbivorous Cetaceans, in common with 
the generality of the Pachyderms, are likewise armed with 
tusks ; so that the interval that separates the Hippopotamus 
and Deinotherium from the Dugong is not very wide. 

The grand function of the, for the most part, mighty animals 
which constitute the tribe I am speaking of, seems to be that 
of inhabiting and finding their subsistence, in the tropical for- 
ests of the old world ; both Africa and Asia have each their 
own rhinoceros, and elephant, which, by their giant bulk, and 
irresistible strength, can make their way through the thickest 
forests or jungles. Even the swine, from the thickness of its 
skin, suffers nothing from pushing through bushes and under- 
wood in search of acorns ; and most of these animals, by means 
of their tusks, muzzle, or horns, can dig up the roots that form 
their food. The hippopotamus seeks his provender in th# 
African rivers, and by means of the tusks with which the under 
jaw is armed, — in this differing from the dugong, in which the 
tusks are in the upper jaw, — is enabled to root up plants grow- 
ing under the water. The tapir acts the same part nearly in 
the New World that the hippopotamus does in the old. 

By the efforts of the Pachyderms, in general, in pursuit of 
their own means of subsistence, a way is often made for man 
more readily to traverse and turn to his purpose forests and 
woody districts, that would otherwise mock his efforts to pene- 
trate into them. When we consider the vast bulk and armour 
of the rhinoceros, for instance, and the violence with which he 

1 Hyrax. 

2 From the Gr. hivos, terrible, and ^iif>i;y, wild beast. 



454 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

endeavours to remove obstacles out of his path, we may in 
some degree calculate the momemtum by which he is enabled 
to win his resistless way through the thickest and most entan- 
gled underwood. 

I need not enlarge on the second Sub-order ^of the Pachyderms, 
the Solipeds, the well-known equine and asinine tribes; every 
one must be struck by the contrast that their structure and 
characters exhibit to those of the first Sub-order, or typical 
ones. A fiery and intelligent eye ; a neck clothed with thunder, 
to use the words of inspiration ; a graceful form ; speed that 
often outstrips the wind; are the distinctive characters which 
the highest tribe of them exhibits ; while the other, though 
less beautiful, still has the organs of sight and hearing singu- 
larly conspicuous ; along tail ; and its integument clothed with 
a shaggy coarse fur : besides these characters, the undivided 
hoof of both these tribes forms also a most striking distinction. 
No animals, indeed, externally present characters more diverse 
from each other than the soliped and typical Pachyderms. 
God has given us these animals, evidently, that we may em- 
ploy them as our servants, and their great function is, to carry 
ourselves and our burthens; they also minister in no small 
degree to our innocent pleasure and amusements, as well as lo 
our defence and security. 

Order S. — Of all the different Orders of the present Class, or 
indeed of all the Classes of animals, none are of so much im- 
portance to their Lord as the Ruminants, which we are next to 
consider ; without them, hunger, cold, and nakedness would 
beset him, or, at least, a large portion of his comforts, with 
respect to articles of food and clothing, must be cut off. 

Cuvier divides this great Order into those that have horns, 
and those that have none, and we may here adopt his division, 
considering these two sections as forming two Sub-orders. The 
first of them, being the beasts of burthen of more than one na- 
tion, may be regarded as succeeding the solipeds; these are 
the camels and dromedaries, the lamas; and perhaps what is 
called the musk-deer, also wanting horns, may be placed 
amongst them. So that we have thus before us animals ihat 
may be regarded as looking towards the Solipeds, in the camel 
genus; towards the sheep by its fleece, in the lama; and to- 
wards the antelope tribes in the musk. 

All the other Ruminants, the males at least, are armed wi(h 
two horns, either simple or branching; either hollow, or solid ; 
either persistent or deciduous. 1 feel disposed to consider the 
giraffe, or camelopard, as an intermediate form between the 
animals that arc horned, and those without horns, for its siiort, 



MAMMALIANS. 455 

persistent, solid horns, clothed with a velvet skin, seem almost 
rudimentary. It may be regarded as connecting, in some 
degree, the long necked animals, the camel and lama, &c. 
with the deer tribe. 

These last, the most elegant and airy, both in form and 
limb and motions, of the whole class, placed in contrast with 
the clumsiness and bulk of the Pachyderms, seem intended as 
one of the principal ornaments of the globe we inhabit, and 
originally to be amongst the peculiar favourites of its king and 
master man. Now, instead of the innocuous animals, he takes 
into his alliance, as his most intimate associates, those that are 
best fitted to pursue and destroy, as the dog, and the cheetah ; 
and thus with the help of the horse, he overtakes these beau- 
tiful creatures, and, instead of caresses, they receive death at 
his hands. 

The head of these animals, in some, as the rein-deer,* in 
both sexes, but generally only in the males, is ornamented, as 
it were, with a branching forest,'^ formed by its antlers, or 
horns, which are soUd, covered, as in the camelopard, with a 
velvet skin, but only during the period of growth, and annually 
deciduous; these are used by the males in their mutual com- 
bats. Amongst these light and airy animals, however, some 
of a larger and more robust stature are thus fitted for the use 
of man, as the rein-deer. The elk, or moose,* the wapiti,* and 
red deers, emulate the horse in size, and are of great strength, 
though not yet employed by man.^ Lastly, come the Rumi- 
nants, whose horns are hollow and naked, but persistent. To 
these belong the Antelopes, one species of which has four 
horns,^ the goats, the sheep, and the bovine tribes. The species 
of the two last of these great families are particularly import- 
ant to man, and are genef^lly so well known as not to require 
to be treated of in detail. The bison,^ with his shaggy mane, 
presents no slight analogy to the lion, the so called king of 
beasts ; and the gnu, reckoned amongst the antelopes, seems 
to combine characters borrowed from the ox and the horse. 

The function of this great Order of Ruminants, is not only 
to browse the herbage, and provide, by constantly trimming, 
and as it were mowing it, for its renewed verdure; many of 
them are employed also in pruning the trees, by feeding upon 
their branches; and there is not one that, in its place, does 
not contribute its part to the general welfare. The cattle on a 

1 Cervus Tarandus. 2 French. Bois. 3 C. alces. 

4 C. strongyitjceras. 5 See above, p. 285. 

6 Ji. Chickara. 7 Bos Urus. 



456 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

thousand hills arc distributed by their Great Creator according' 
to certain laws, and by their actions in ilieir several spheres, to 
promote certain erids, which neglected, or imperfectly pro- 
vided for, would produce derangements that might affect a 
wide circumfeience. 

Order 4. — Having, in a former part of the preneiit volume, 
given an account of the principal tribes of this Order, I need 
not here do more than mention it, except by observing, that 
the members of it are principally inhabitants of the new world, 
the Manis and Orycteropus, being the only genera it contains 
that are found in the old. 

Order 5. — The animals included in the Order of Rodents^ or 
gnawers and nibblers, as 1 have before observed,* seem to 
occupy the same station amongst the Mammalians, that the 
Hymenoptera do amongst Insects, since they are the most re- 
markable of any for the arts which Providence has instructed 
them to exercise. This, as w^ell as the preceding Order, seems 
very slightly connected with the great tribe of Ruminants : 
the Patagonian hare,^ however, of the Pampas, belonging to 
the Rodents, seems, in its light and elegant form, to make the 
nearest approximation to that tribe. 

Several of the animals of the Order before us copy the mem- 
bers of the class of insects in one of their most remarkable pecu- 
liarities; during the cold or winter season, they become torpid. 
This is the case with the dormouse,^ the marmots,* the prarie- 
dog,'^ and many other Rodents, as well as with many preda- 
ceous Mammalians, especially the insectivorous ones, as the 
hedge-hogs." The mole, and the bats, and even some of the 
largest animals, as the bear, are subject to the same law. 
When we consider the case of the insectivorous animals of the 
present class, we see at once the witdom and goodness of the 
Lawgiver in this enactment. The reduction of the tempera- 
ture, and other causes, have driven the insects from the thea- 
tre they usually frequent, to remain for a time without motion 
under the earth and other places of security, where they are 
safe from these their enemies ; it was, therefore a kind and 
wise provision, that as their accustomed food was beyond their 
reach, they themselves should also be placed in a state not to 
require it. Many other animals amongst the Rodents, though 
they do not pass the winter in a state of absolute torpidity, 



1 


Sec above, p. 200. 


2 


Caria pat agonic a 


[i 


Myoxus avclUinar'uii!. 


4 


.^rctoinijs. 


5 


Spermophiliis ludoviciamis. 


Faun. Boreal. Amcric. 


i. 156. 


G 


Erinaccus. 







MAMMALIANS. 457 

retreat, lo wlial may be called their winter quarters, in which 
the}^ have laid up a store of provisions against the evil days of 
winter. Of this description are many of the murine tribes, 
particularly the hamster,^ which is furnished with a pouch on 
each side of its mouth, that it fills with grain to deposit in its » 
burrow, for a winter store. Some will thus carry as much as 
three ounces at a time. The lemmings^ also, whose destruc- 
tive ravages I have before noticed, ^ especially thai called the 
economist,"^ have similar habits, storing up roots instead of grain. 

Generally speaking, it is the lowering of the temperature 
that induces Mammalians, as well as cold-blooded animals, to 
hybernate, and brings on a state of torpidity, or a cessation of 
the usual stimulus to locomotion and action : in which state, 
Mr Owen remarks, icarm-blooded animals become, as it were, 
cold-blooded. As a watch not wound up remains without mo- 
tion, still retaining the power of resuming it, and when the 
mainspring recovers its elasticity is again enabled to act upon 
its wheels : so to animals heat is the key that winds up the 
wheels, and restores to the mainspring its power of reaction. 
Hybernating animals have supernumerary cells, and generally 
become very fat in autumn, and it has been said that this fat 
supports them in their torpid state; it is found, however, that 
there has been but little of it consumed during the state of 
torpidity, but that it wastes, very fast immediately after that 
state is ended. The Indians remark, with respect to the black 
bear, that it comes out in the spring with the same fat which 
it carries in in the autumn ; but after the exercise of only a 
few days it becomes lean.* A state of periodical rest may be 
necessary to the animals we are speaking of, not only as a 
means of protection from the effects of a low temperature, and 
on account of the impossibility of procuring their usual means 
of subsistence ; but sirice alternate rest and action are neces- 
sary to most animals, so a longer period of sleep may be re- 
quired in some cases, by such cessation of action to keep the 
machine from wearing out too soon. Excess of heat we know 
produces the same effect as excess of cold, it disposes to sleep.^ 
The tenrec,7 a Madagascar animal, and the jerboa, fall into a 
kind of summer lethargy from that cause, which lasts some 
months.^ 

From the numerous instances of remarkable instincts exhi- 



1 


Cricetus. 




2 


Arvicola. Lemmus. 


3 


See above, p. 49. 




4 


L. (Bconomus. 


5 


Fn. Boreal. Americ. 


1.20. 


6 


JV. D. D'H. JV. xxxi. 387—390 


7 


Setiger. 

3h 




8 


JV. D. D'H. JV. xxxiii. 53. 



458 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

bited by the animals of this Order, which might be selected, I 
must confine myself to one or two of the most singular. The 
hare is only noticed for its extreme timidy and watchfulness, 
and the rabbit for the burrows which it excavates for its own 
habitation, and as a nest for its young : but there is an animal 
related to them, the rat-hare,^ whicfi is gifted by its creator 
with a very singular instinct, on account of which it ought 
rather to be called the hay-maker, since man may or might 
have learned that part of the business of the agriculturist, 
which consists in providing a store of winter provender for his 
cattle, from this industrious animal. Professor Pallas was the 
first who described the quadruped exercising this remarkable 
function and gave an account of it. The Tungusians, who 
inhabit the country beyond the lake of Baikal, call it Pika, 
which has been adopted as its Trivial name. 

These animals make their abode between the rocks, and 
during the summer employ themselves in making hay for a 
winter store. Inhabiting the most northern districts of the old 
world, the chain of Altaic Mountains, extending from Siberia 
to the confines of Asia and Kamtschatka,^ they never appear 
in the plains, or in places exposed to observation ; but always 
select the rudest and most elevated spots, and often the centre 
of the most gloomy, and at the same time humid forests, where 
the herbage is fresh and abundant. They generally hollow 
out their burrows between the stones and in the clefts of the 
rocks, and sometimes in the holes of trees. Sometimes they 
live in solitude and sometimes in small societies, according to 
the nature of the mountains they inhabit. 

About the middle of the month of August these little ani- 
mals collect with admirable precaution their winter's provender, 
which is formed of select herbs, which they bring near their 
habitation and spread out to dry like hay. In September, they 
form heaps or stacks of the fodder they have collected under 
the rocks or in other places sheltered from the rain or snow. 
Where many of them have laboured together their stacks are 
sometimes as high as a man, and more than eight feet in di- 
ameter. A subterranean gallery leads from the burrow, below 
the mass of hay, so that neither frost nor snow can intercept 
their communication WMth it. Pallas had the patience to ex- 
amine their provision of hay piece by piece, and found it to 
consist chiefly of the choicest grasses, and the sweetest herbs, 

1 Lagomys. 

2 Mr Daines Harrington presented to the Royal Society an animal reaera- 
bling the Pika found in Scotland, but probably a different speciM. 



MAMMALIANS. 459 

all cut when most vigorous, and dried so slowly as to form a 
green and succulent fodder ; he found in it scarcely any ears, 
or blossoms, or hard and woody stems, but some mixture of 
bitter herbs, probably useful to render the rest more wholesome. 
These stacks of excellent forage -are sought out by the sable- 
hunters to feed their harassed horses, and the (Jakutes) na- 
tives of that part of Siberia, pilfer them, if I may so call it, for 
the subsistence of their cattle. Instead of imitating the fore- 
sight and industry of the Pika, they rob it of its means of sup- 
port, and so devote the animals that set them so good an 
example to famine and death.* How much better would it be 
if instead of robbing and starving these interesting animals, 
they learned from them to provide in the proper season a sup- 
ply of hay for the winter provender of their horses. 

But no animals in this, or indeed any other Order of Mam- 
malians, are so admirable for their instincts and their results 
as the beavers. 

I have more than once alluded to some proceedings of these, 
seemingly, half-reasoning animals, and shall now as briefly as 
possible give some account of those fabrics in which their 
wonderful instinct is principally manifested. There are two 
writers who had great opportunities of gaining information 
concerning them; Samuel Hearne, during his journey to the 
Northern Ocean, in the years 1769, 1770, 1771, and 1772; 
and Captain Cartwright, who resided nearly sixteen years on 
the coast of Labrador. To them I am principally indebted for 
the particulars of the history here given. 

From the breaking up of the frost to the fall of the leaf, the 
beavers desert their lodges, and roam about unhoused, and 
unoccupied by their usual labours, except that they have the 
foresight to begin felling their timber early in the summer. 
They set about building some time in the month of August. 
Those that erect their habitations in small rivers or creeks, in 
which the water is liable to be drained off, with wonderful 
sagacity provide against that evil by forming a dike across the 
stream, almost straight where the current is weak, but where 
it is more rapid, curving more or less, with the convex side 
opposed to the stream. They construct these dikes or dams of 
the same materials as they do their lodges, namely, of pieces of 
wood of any kind, of stones, mud, and sand. These cause- 
ways oppose a sufficient barrier to the force, both of water and 
ice; and as the willows, poplars, &c. employed in constructing 
them, often strike root in it, it becomes in time a green hedge, 

1 .y n. DH. ,Y. xxvi. 407—410. 



460 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

in which the birds build their nests. Caitwright says that he 
occasionally used thenfi as bridges, but as they are level with 
the water, not without wetting his feet. By means of these 
erections the water is kept at a sufficient height, for it is abso- 
lutely necessary that there should be at least three feet of water 
above the extremity of the entry into their lodges, without 
which, in the hard frosts, it would be entirely closed. This 
entry is not on the land side, because such an opening might let 
in the wolverene, and other fierce beasts, but tow^ards the water. 
Cuvter, in his table above alluded to,^ assigns only four pec- 
toral teats to the female beaver ; but Dr Richardson states that 
she has eight, and the maxium of her young ones at eight or 
nine.^ The number inhabiting one lodge seldom exceeds four 
old and six or eight young ones ; the size of their houses, there- 
fore, is regulated by the number of the family. Though built 
of the same materials, they are of much ruder structure than 
their causeways, and the only object of their erection appears 
to be a dry apartment to repose in, and where they can eat 
the food they occasionally get out of the water. It frequently 
happens, says Hearne, that some of the large houses have one 
or more partitions, but these are merely part of the building 
left to support the roof. He had seen one beaver lodge that 
had nearly a dozen apartments under the same roof, and, two 
or three excepted, none had any communication but by water. 
Cartwright says, that when they build, their first step is to 
make choice of a nutural basin, of a certain depth, near the 
bank where there is no rock ; they then begin to excavate 
under water, at the base of the bank, which they enlarge 
upwards gradually, and so as to form a declivity, till they reach 
the surface ; and of the earth which comes out of this cavity 
they form a hillock, with which they mix small pieces of wood, 
and even stones : they give this hillock the form of a dome, 
from four to seven feet high, from ten to twelve long, and from 
eight to nine wide. As they proceed in heightening, they 
hollow it out below, so as to form the lodge which is to receive 
the family. At the anterior part of this dwelling, they form a 
gentle declivity terminating at the water ; so that they enter 
and go out under water. The hunters name this entrance 
the angle. The interior forms only a single chamber resem- 
bling an oven. At a little distance is the magazine for 
provisions. Here they keep in store the roots of the yel- 
low water-lily, and the branches of the black spruce,^ the 

1 See above, p. 44!2. 2 Fn. Boreal, .hncr. i. p. 107 

3 Mies nigra. 



MAMMALIANS. 461 

aspin,* and birch, ^ which they are careful to plant in the mud. 
These form their subsistence. Their magazines sometimes 
contain a cart-load of these articles, and the beavers are so in- 
dustrious, that they are always adding to their store. 

There is a species of beaver found in the great rivers in Eu- 
rope — the Danube, the Rhine, the Rhone, and the Weser, 
which has been regarded as synonymous with the beaver of 
Canada, but which, though it forms burrows or holes in the 
banks of those rivers which it frequents, does not, like them, 
erect any lodges, as above described. Does this instinct sleep 
in them, and require a certain degree of cold to awaken it, or 
are they a distinct species ] Linne mentions one in Lapland, 
where the cold is sufficiently intense. Cuvier seems uncertain 
whether they ought to be considered as distinct. Beavers 
seem formerly to have existed in England ; the town of Bever- 
ley (Beaver-field) f in Yorkshire, seems to have taken its name 
from them, and its arms are three beavers. 

Such are the principal operations that these wonderful ani- 
mals, probably by the mixture of intellect with instinct, are 
instructed and adapted by their Creator to execute, that man, 
by studying them and their ways, may acknowledge the Power, 
Wisdom, and Goodness that formed and guides them. 

The functions of the numerous tribes of this Order are va- 
rious. The great majority may be said to be granivorous, or 
nucivorous, or even graminivorous; but many live upon dried ve- 
getable substances, and wood. The aye aye, which approaches 
the Quadrumanes, appears to be insectivorous. Though many 
of them are great plagues to man, yet, by exciting his vigi- 
lance, they are useful to him, and they form the food of many 
of the lesser predaceous animals. 

Order 6. — The connection between the animals of which 
this Order consists, and the Rodents, seems not easily made 
out. The lowest tribe, the Amphibians, which Cuvier has 
placed immediately before the Marsupians, appears to have no 
connection with that Order, or any of the Rodents ; and the 
morse, which forms his last genus of the tribe in question, ap- 
pears evidently to look more towards the herbivorous cetaceans, 
the manatee,^ &c. than to any other animals ; the seals, in- 
deed, may be regarded as tending towards the feline tribe. 
Amongst the other Predaceans, the hedgehog and tenrec pre- 
sent, I apprehend, something more than an analogy to the 

1 Populus tremida., 2 Betnla alba. 3 Cheiromys. 



462 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

porcupines and some of the rats. The bear seems to look to- 
wards the sloth ; and the fehne race, in their whiskers and 
feet, look to the hares and rats. 

The general functions of this Order are to check the tend- 
ency to increase not only in their own Class, the Mammalians, 
but in most of the other Classes of animals, more particularly 
those which man has taken into alliance with him, as cattle, 
and poultry, and game of every description. But where his 
action is greatest, theirs is usually least ; and the most power- 
ful devastators of the animal kinkdom, the lions and the tigers, 
are found in the warmest climates, where nature is most pro- 
lific, and where man has not fully established his dominion, in 
the trackless and burning deserts of Libya, and in the impene- 
trable forests and jungles of India. 

In more northern regions, the bears, the foxes, and other 
Mammalians, are employed in this department, though the 
former also eat roots and other vegetable substances,^ and thus 
in the wild countries of the north supply the place of man, 
and keep the animal population under, and at a certain level, 
so that one may not encroach upon another. If the matter is 
closely investigated, we shall find that God has distributed 
and divided these predaceous animals to every country, in 
measure and momentum, as every one had need. 

The necrophagous Mammalians'* also, or those that devour 
dead carcasses, such as the hyaenas, dogs, and similar animals, 
are equally useful in removing infectious substances, which 
in hot climates soon generate disease, and are always dis- 
gusting objects, and exercise a very important and beneficial 
function, devolved upon them by their Creator ; for if all the 
animals exercising this function were removed from the earth, 
it would soon be depopulated, and a universal pestilence would 
destroy man, and all his subject animals. 

Order 7. — The animals of this Order, though evidently lead- 
ing towards the Quadrumanes, seems less nearly connected 
with the insectivorous Predaceans of Cuvier, the hedgehog, 
mole, &c., and to approach nearer to some Marsupians, as the 
flying squirrel and the flying opossum. I therefore consider 
them as forming an Osculant Order, distinguished by their 
powers and organs of flight before sufficiently noticed.^ They 
are nocturnal animals, and live entirely upon insects. In the 
winter, they become torpid, and suspend themselves by the 

1 Fn. BormL Jlmeric. i. 15, 23, 28. 2 Carnivora. Cuv. 

3 See above, p. 272. 



MAMMALIANS. 463 

claw of the thumb of the fore-foot, which is left free for this and 
other purposes. 

Order 8. — Linne evidently degraded man when he placed him 
in the same Order with the monkey, and even considered his 
genus Homo as consisting of two species, advancing the Ouran 
Outan^ to the honour of being his congener, and a second spe- 
cies of man. Cuvier has, with great propriety, separated man, 
the heir of immortality, and whose spirit goeth upward, from the 
beast that perisheth, and whose spirit goeth downward,'^ and 
placed them in different Orders. Man has employed some 
animals in almost every Order, or taken them under his care ; 
but there is only a single instance of a Quadrumane being so 
used. There is a kind of monkey,^ a native of Madagascar, 
which, being of a gentle disposition, the natives of the southern 
part of that island take when they are young, and educate, as 
we do hounds, for the chase.* 

The principal function of these animals is to Hve and move 
in the trees, amongst the branches in tropical countries, and 
they subsist upon fruits, roots, the eggs of birds, and insects. 
One object of their creation seems to be to hold the mirror to 
man, that he may see how ugly and disgusting an object he 
becomes when he gives himself up to vice and the slave of his 
passions. In fact, in every department of the animal kingdom, 
the moral instruction of his reasonable creature seems to have 
been one of the objects of Creative Wisdom : and the sloth and 
the glutton may be added to the mandril and baboon as equally 
calculated to cause him to view vice with disgust and abhor- 
rence ; as the bee, the ant, and the beaver, to excite him to 
industry, and prudence, and foresight ; or the dove to peace and 
mutual love. 

1 Written also Ourang Outang, and Orang Otang. 

2 Eccles. iii. 21. 3 Indris brevicaudatus. 
4 JV. D. D'H. JV . xvi. 171. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

Functions and Instincts. Man. 

After traversing the whole Animal Kingdom from its very 
lowest grades, and having arrived at Man, who confessedly 
stands at the head, and is the only visible king and lord of all 
the rest, it will be expected that I should devote a few pages to 
the world's master. 

' --"BaronlCuvier, with great propriety, places him by himself 

in a separate Order, distinguished from that which succeeds it, 

...^ in his system, by the significant appellation of Bimane, indicat- 

».- ing that his two hands are the instruments by which he sub- 

._^ dues and governs the planet that he inhabits ;* by v;hich also 
,_^-he is enabled to embody his conceptions, and, as it were, to 
— -^ convert his thoughts into material subsistences. 

I shall consider him both physically and metaphysically ; 
physically, as to his actual position, and as to his action upon 
his subjects and property, whether vegetable or animal ; and 
metaphysically as to his connection with that world, to which 
his mind or spirit belongs. When I say that Man stands at 
the head of the creation, I do not mean to affirm that he com- 
bines in himself every physical attribute in perfection that is 
found in all the animals below him ; for it is manifest to every 
one, that many of them far exceed him in the perfection of 
many of their organs, and in their qualities of various kinds. 
For sight, he cannot compete with the eagle; for scent, with the 
hound, or the shark; for swiftness, with the roe-huck; for strength 
and bulk, with the elephant : but it is in his mind that his 
superiority lies. There is in him a spirit, an immaterial sub- 
stance which constitutes him the sole representative here on 
earth, of the spirit of spirits. He is the only member of 
the Animal Kingdom that partakes both of a heavenly and of 
an earthly nature, — that belongs both to a material and an 
immaterial world : and on this account it was that God, when 
he had created man, constituted him king over the whole 

1 See above, p. 302. 



MAN. 465 

sphere of animals with which he had peopled this globe that 
we inhabit. When liis unhappy fall took place, the Divine 
Image was impaired, and consequently (he dominion over those 
creatures, which formed a part of it, was proportionably weak- 
ened, and reduced to its present standard. But still, though 
weakened, it is not abrogated ; his subjects have not universally 
broken the yoke and burst the bonds of his dominion — a large 
portion of them still acknowledge him as their king and master; 
and those that he has not subdued so as to make them do his 
bidding, still fear him and flee him: and even of these, there is 
none so fierce and intractable, that he has not found means to 
tame and subdue. And this is the position in which he now 
stands with respect lo the animal kingdom; he has that within 
him that enables him to master them, and apply such of them 
as are of a convertible i^.ature, if I may so speak, to work his 
will and answer his pui'pose. 

The functions of man, \A'ith regard to the world in which he 
is now placed, are all included in his action upon the sphere 
of animals and vegetables, and in their re-action upon him. If 
we survey all nature, wherever we turn our eyes, or wherever 
we direct our thoughts, we see the action of antagonist powers, 
a flux and reflux, by which the Great Builder of the universe 
supports the vast machine, and maintains all the motions that 
he has generated in it. The same principle is at work in every 
description of beings in our own planet; every action of man 
upon any object of the world, without him, produces a reaction 
from that object, attended often by important results. 

The action of man upon the world without him, is threefold. 
His first action upon them is, that of the mind to contemplate 
them, so as to gain a knowledge of their forms and structure — 
of their habits and instincts — of their meaning and uses. His 
second action upon them, having studied their natures, and 
discovered how they may be made profitable to him, is to col- 
lect and multiply such species as he finds will, in any w^ay, 
answer his purpose. His third action upon them is to dimin- 
ish and keep within due limits those species that experience 
teaches him are noxious and prejudicial either to himself, or 
those animals that he has taken into alliance with him, which 
are principal sources of wealth to him, and minister to his daily 
use, comfort, and enjoyment. 

If we consider the predaceous animals, we shall find in them 
a greater tendency to multiply than in those that content them- 
selves with grazing the herbage; they generally produce more 
young at a birth ; and their period of gestation is often shorter, 
so as to admit of more than one litter in the year; so that, un- 
3i 



466 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

less some means were used to reduce tlieir numbers within a 
certain limit, the whole race of herbivorous animals must per- 
ish. Hence arose the first kind of war. Man armed himself 
to destroy such of his subjects as had rejected his dominion, 
and even contended with him for the possession of the earth, 
and to have license to devour at will its more peaceful inhabi- 
tants. A similar cause generated the other and more fearful 
kind of war, of man with man. Whence come wars and fight- 
ings amongst you, saith the Apostle ;^ come they not hence, even of 
your lusts that war in your members ? 

The highest view that we can take of man is that which 
looks upon him as belonging to a spiritual as well as a material 
world. The end of the creation of the earth, says the father 
and founder of Natural History, is the glory of God, from the 
works of nature, by man only.^ And, as the same pious author 
observes, " How contemptible is man," if he does not aim at 
this end of his creation, if he does not strive to raise himself 
above the low pursuits that usually occupy his mind !^ The 
heavens indeed declare the glory of God, and the firmament 
showeth the work of his hands. Day unto day "uttereth speech, 
and night unto night showeth knowledge.* Tlie beasts of the 
field honour him, and all creatures that he hath made glorify 
him. But man must study the book open before him ; and the 
more he studies it, the more audible to him will be the general 
voice to his spiritual ear, and he will clearly perceive that every 
created thing glorifies God in its place, by fulfilling his will, 
and the great purpose of his providence ; but that he himself 
alone can give a tongue to every creature, and pronounce for 
all a general doxology. 

But further, in contemplating them, he will not only behold 
the glory of the Godhead reflected, but, from their several 
instincts and characters, he may derive much spiritual instruc- 
tion. Whoever surveys the three kingdoms of nature with 
any attention, will discover in every department objects that, 
without any affinity, appear to represent each other. Thus 
we have minerals that, under certain circumstances, as it were, 
vegetate, and shoot into various forms, representing trees and 
plants: there are plants that represent insects, and, vice versa, 
insects that simulate plants ; and the Zoophytes have received 
their name from this resemblance.* And as we ascend the 

1 James, iv. 1. 

2 Finis creationis telluris est gloria Dei exopere natures per hominem solum. 
Linn. Syst, JVat. i. Inlroil. i. 

3 quam corUempta res est humcc 7iist supra huwavn se crrxerit. Ibid. 
A Ps. xix. 1, 'Z. 5 Sec abovf, pp. 80, 84, IKV 



MAN. 467 

scale, every where a series of references of one thing to another 
may be (raced, so as to render it very probable ihnt every 
created thing lias its representative soniewiiere in nature. Nor 
is this resemblance confined io forms ; it extends also to char- 
acter. If we begin at the bottom of the scalej and ascend up 
to man, we shall find two descriptions in almost every class, 
and even tribe of aniinals: one, ferocious in their aspect., often 
rapid in their motions, predaceous in their habits, preying upon 
their fellows, and living by rapine and bloodshed ; while the 
other is quiet and harmless, making no attacks, shedding no 
blood, and subsisting mostly on a vegetable diet. 

Since God created nothing in vain, we may rest assured that 
this system of representation was establisbed with a particular 
view. The most common mode of instruction is placing certain 
signs or symbols before the eye of the learner, which represent 
sounds or ideas ; and so the great Instructor of man placed this 
world before him as an open though mystical book, in which 
the different objects w^ere the letters and words of a language, 
from the study of which he might gain wisdom of various kinds, 
and be instructed in such truths relating to that spiritual 
world, to which his soul belonged, as God saw fit thus to reveal 
to him. In the first place, by observing that one object in na- 
ture represented another, he would be taught that all things 
are significant, as well as intended to act a certain part in the 
general drama; and further, as he proceeded to trace the ana- 
logies of character, in its two great branches just alluded to 
upwards, he would be led to the knowledge of the doctrine thus 
symbolically revealed — that in the invisible world there are 
two classes of spirits — one benevolent and beneficent, and the 
other malevolent and mischievous ; characters, which, after 
his fall, he would find even exemplified in individuals of his own 
species. 

But after the unhappy fall of man, this mode of instruction 
by natural and other objects used symbolically, though it per- 
vades the whole law of Moses, and the writings of the prophets, 
as well as several parts of the New Testament, gradually gave 
place to the clearer light of a Revelation, not by symbols, but 
by the words and language of man, which he that runs may often 
read; yet still it is a very useful and interesting study, and 
belongs to man as the principal inhabitant of a world stored 
with symbols, to ascertain what God intended to signify by 
the objects that he has created and placed before him, as well 
as to know their natures and uses. When we recollect what 
the Apostle tells us, that the invisible things of God from the 
creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things 



468 FUNCTIONS AND INSTINCTS. 

that are made,^ and that spiritual truths are reflected as by a 
mirror, and shown, as it were, enigmatically,^ we shall be 
convinced that, in this view, the study of nature, if properly 
conducted, may be made of the first importance. 



In this enumeration and history of the principal tribes of the 
Animal Kingdom, we have traced in every page the footsteps of 
infinite Wisdom, Power, and Goodness. In our ascent from the 
most minute and least animated parts of that Kingdom to man 
himself, we have seen in every department tliat nothing was 
left to chance, or the rule of circumstances, but every thing 
was adapted by its structure and organization for the situation 
in which it was to be placed, and the functions it was to dis- 
charge ; that though every being, or group of beings, had 
separate interests, and wants, all were made to subserve to a 
common purpose, and to promote a common object j and that 
though there was a general and unceasing conflict between 
the members of this sphere of beings, introducing apparently 
death and destruction into every part of it, yet that by this 
great mass of seeming evil pervading the whole circuit of the 
animal creation, the renewed health and vigour of the entire 
system was maintained. A part suflfers for the benefit and 
salvation of the whole ; so that the doctrine of the suffer- 
ing of one creature, by the will of God, being necessary to 
promote the welfare of another, is irrefragably established by 
every thing we see in nature; and further, that there is an 
unseen hand directing all to accomplish this great object, and 
taking care that the destruction shall in no case exceed the 
necessity. Well, then, may all finally exclaim, in the words 
of the Divine Psalmist: — 

Lord, how manifold are thy works, in WISDOM hast thou 
made them all; the earth is full of thy riches. 

So is the great and wide sea also, wherein are things creeping 
innumerable both small and great beasts. 

These wait all upon thee : that thou may est give them meat in due 
season. 

When thou givest them they gather it : and when thou openest thy 
hand they are filled with good. 

When thou hidest thy face they arc troubled : when thou takest 
away their breath they die, and are turned again to their dust. 

When thou lettest thy breath go forth they shall be made: and 
thou shalt renew the face of the earth. 

1 Rom. i.20. 'J 1 Cor. xiii. Vi. 



APPENDIX. 



Since the preceding part of this treatise had mostly passed 
through the press, I have had an opportunity of consulting 
some recently published works, which contain accounts, illus- 
trated by figures, of many very interesting animals belonging 
to several of the Classes of which I have there treated ; and 
all of which more or less demonstrate a presiding Intelligence 
immediately connected with the globe that we inhabit, and 
who, viewed under every aspect, evidently careth for us, and 
all the creatures he has made. I shall select a few of these for 
the consideration of the reader. 

I formerly observed^ that types representing sonrieof the higher 
forms of the animal kingdom were often to be detected amongst 
those belonging to its lowest grade: a remarkable instance of 
this may be seen in one of Ehrenberg's late works,^ in which 
is described and figured a singular Polygastric Infusory, which 
seems to exhibit the first outline of an Arachnidan^ form ; it 
has eight locomotive organs or bristles, representing the eight 
legs of those animals.* By means of these organs, this animal, 
which was found by Dr Ehrenberg in the Red Sea, performs a 
double rotatory movement, one by the rotation of the anterior 
pair, and the other by the three posterior pairs. The motion 
of these filamentous legs is so rapid that they appear as if, 
instead of eight, a hundred were revolving, and so form a kind 
of natural Phantasmascope. Another infusory genus, Bacil- 
laria, seems to prefigure the Salpes,^ the species at first being 
concatenated in chains or ribands, and afterwards separating.^ 
The animalcules forming this genus have sometimes been 
mistaken for plants, and the quadrangular form of the asso- 
ciated individuals gives them the appearance of the jointed 
stem of a plant, rather than of an animal chain. On a former 
occasion, I alluded to other imitations of the vegetable world 

1 See above, p. 358. 2 Symbolce Physica. 

3 Discocephalus Rotator. 4 Plate I. A. Fig. 6. 

5 See above, p. 307. 6 Plate I. A. Fig. 4,5. 



470 APPENDIX. 

exhibited by the polypes, particularly to some of them produc- 
ing seeming blossoms, consisting, as it were, of many petals.^ 
I shall now notice some that represent monopetalous flowers. 
A genus long known to naturalists, which seems intermediate 
between the Infusories and the Polypes, named originally by 
hiane Vorticella, exactly simulates a bell flower with a spiral 
footstalk. They are often found in fresh water, and present 
no unapt representation of a bunch of the flowers of the Lily 
of the valley, whence one species has been named Vorticella 
Convallaria. Some of these have branching, and others simple 
stems,2 but they are all spiral, and capable of being lengthened 
or shortened at the will of the animal, which is thus enabled 
to elevate or depress its little blossonas, the mouths of which 
are furnished with a double circlet of filamentary tentacles, by 
the rotation of wnich, like the rest of its tribe, it can produce 
a food-conveying current to its mouth. Still nearer to the 
Polypes, with which indeed it is arranged, is another genus 
representing monopetalous flowers, named by Ehrenberg, who 
found it in the Red sea, Zoobotryon, or Animal-grape. This 
singular animal production will scarcely arrange under any of 
the Orders mentioned on a former occasion, but it may be re- 
garded as intermediate between the Rotatories and the Polypes. 
Like the latter it is a compound animal, consisting of a naked 
branching stem ; its lower extremity, as may be seen in the 
figure,^ appears as if sending forth numerous little radicles, and 
the branches terminate in ovate germs, from which issue a 
multitude of animalcules resembling monopetalous bell-shaped 
flowers, with the mouth surrounded by a filamentous coronet, 
each sitting upon a spiral elastic footstalk, by means of which 
the animalcule can either draw itself close to the stem, or, shoot- 
ing out, dart on either side after its prey. When the mouth of 
every individual is open, each germ looks like what botanists 
call a raceme of bell-shaped flowers; and, when they are closed, 
they resemble a bunch of grapes.* 

To the class of Worms, especially those that have been de- 
nominated Entozoa, or internal worms, I have a few interesting 
additions to make, taken from a work of Dr Nordmann's,^ some 
of which are so extraordinary and wonderful, both as to their 
functions and structure, that the great object of the present 

1 See above, p. 279. 2 Ihiil. i>77. 

3 PrATE T. li. Fu:. 2. a. 4 Ibid, b 

•5 Micrograpliische lie'Urdge, &.c. 



) 



APPENDIX. 471 

treatise, Gloria Del ex opere nature, will receive considerable 
illustration from some account of them. 

Dr Nordmann's first treatise is upon a tribe of these creatures 
that are interesting from their very singular situation, in the 
Eyes, namely, of the higher animals. 

Amongst the personal pests of our own species, enumerated 
in the chapter above alluded to,* I mentioned none that at- 
tacked the organs just named; but this learned investigator of 
parasitic worms has noticed two which have been detected in 
them ; one related to the Guinea-worm,^ which was extracted 
from the eye of a person affected by a cataract ;' and another, 
a Hydatid* from the eye of a young woman. 

Besides those that infest our own visual organs, quadrupeds, 
birds, reptiles, and fishes, have each their eye-worms. Amongst 
those to which the will of Providence has assigned their station 
in the eyes of the latter class of animals, is a remarkable one,* 
which Dr Nordmann discovered in those of several different spe- 
cies of perch,^ sometimes, in such numbers, as must have inter- 
fered with that distinct sight of passing objects, which appears 
necsesary to enable predaceous animals to discover their prey in 
time to dart upon it and secure it ; in a single eye the Doctor 
detected, in different parts, 360 ! of these animalcules : when 
much increased they often produce cataracts in the eye of the 
fishes they infest. This httle animal appears something related 
to the Planaria, or pseudo-leech, and, to judge from Dr Nord- 
mann's figures, seems able, like it, to change its form''. Un- 
derneath the body, at the anterior extremity, is the mouth ; 
and in the middle are what he denominates two sucking-cups ;* 
these are prominent, and viewed laterally form a truncated 
cone ; the anterior one is the smallest and least prominent, and 
more properly a sucker ; the other probably has other functions, 
since he could never ascertain that it was used for prehension. 

A kind of metamorphosis seems to take place in these animals, 
for our author observed that they appeared under three dif- 
ferent forms. 

These little pests, small as they are, have a parasite of their 
own to avenge the cause of the perch, for Dr Nordmann ob- 
served some very minute brown dots or capsules attached to* 
the intestinal canal, which when extracted, by means of a 



1 See above, p. 360. 2 Filaria medinensis. 

3 F. Oculi humani. 4 Cysticercus cellulosa. 

5 Dipiostomumvolvens^Vi.kTT^l.'Q.YiG.b. 6 Ihid.YiG.Q. 

7 See Nordmann's Micrograph, i. t. ii.f. 1 — 9. 

8 Saugnapfe. 



472 APPENDIX. 

scalpel formed of the thorns of the creeping cereus,* and laid 
upon a piece of talc, the membrane that inclosed them burst, 
and forth issued living animalcules, belonging to the genus 
Monas, and smaller than M. Glomus, which immediately turned 
round upon their own axis with great velocity, and then jumped 
a certain distance in a straight line, when they again revolved, 
and again took a second leap. 

Looking over our author's list of eye- worms that infest fishes, 
we find that five out of seven are attached to different species 
of perch, and one cannot help feeling some commiseration for 
these poor animals ; but when we recollect that they form the 
most numerous body of predaceous fishes in our rivers, we may 
conjecture that thus their organs of vision are rendered less 
acute, and that thus thousands of roach, dace, carp, and tench 
may escape destruction. The ever watchful eye of a Father 
Providence is over all his works, and he has provided means, 
in every department of the animal kingdom, so to limit the 
inroads of the predaceous species, that a due proportion and 
harmonious mixture may every where be maintained, and that 
with respect to every individual species. The means are va- 
rious, but the end is one ; and the partial evil terminates in 
the general good and welfare of the whole. 

Next to the eyes, the gills of fishes are subject to annoyance 
from internal worms ; and amongst these there is none more 
remarkable or wonderful than one first discovered by Dr Nord- 
mann, upon those of the bream,^ and to which, on account 
of its remarkable structure and conformation, he has given 
the name of Diplozoon, or Double animal. In the Classes of 
Polypes and Tunicaries we have been introduced to many 
animals that appear to be compound ; which, from a common 
stem or body send forth numerous oscula or mouths, in tliis 
emulating the membersof the vegetable kingdom : but amongst 
all these plant-animals,^ there is none can compete with this 
of Dr Nordmann, which, like the Siamese youths, appears to 
be formed of two distinct bodies, united in the middle so as to 
present the appearance of a St Andrew's cross, each half of 
the animal containing precisely the same organs ; namely, an 
alimentary canal, a system for circulation and generation, and 
also a nervous system. Miiller calls the innumerable and 
varying cohorts of the animal creation preachers of the infinite 
wisdom and power of tlie Sovereign of the world ;* and this is 

1 Cactus flag cJlif or mis. 2 Cyprimis Brama. 

3 Phytozoa. 4 Entomostraca. 27 



APPENDIX. 473 

one of the most wonderful of ihem nil, which singularly ex- 
emplifies those attributes. 

At first it might be imagined, tha(, like the youths just 
alluded to, this was a monstrous production of tmture ; but Dr 
Nordmann relates that he has found thirty specimens, precisely 
ag^reeing with each other, all in a similar situation, attached 
namely, to the gills of the fish mentioned above, and he never 
found it single, or in any other situation : there can, therefore, 
remain no doubt on the subject. In order to find these ani- 
mals, it is necessary to examine all the leaves of the gills 
separately under water, or to separate the lesser whitish ones 
with a pointed instrument, when the animal may be detected 
by its movements : its station is between the leaves or folds of 
the inner gills. 

This singular creature consists of two lobes, or arms, above 
the point of union, and two below it. The upper pair are the 
longest and most divergent : they are somew^hat lance-shaped, 
and at the extremity of each, on the under side, is a mouth, 
with a sucker, divided by a fleshy transverse septum ; by 
means of these suckers, the mouths of this two-bodied mon- 
ster are kept steady, so as to suck without intermission. 
The orifice of the mouth is large, and, when fully open, trian- 
gular : there is also an organ within the gullet which seem& 
analogous to a tongue, resembling the sucking organ of the 
pseudo-leech. The alimentary canal branches out on both 
sides into numerous blind vessels. The whole of this canal, 
like the creature itself, is cruciform. The circulation of the 
blood is very visible : each half of the animal has on both sides 
tw^o principal blood vessels, which are every where of almost 
equal diameter, without any enlargement ; in the two exterior 
ones the blood runs upwards, and in the two interior ones 
downwards, and its motion is extremely rapid. The genera- 
tive organs and ovaries are also double. The feces, as in the 
polypes and other lower animals, pass out at the mouth. The 
two lowest lobes are somewhat club-shaped, or thickest at the 
extremity, towards which, in each, are two oval plates, or 
disks, containimg four oblong acetabula, or suckers : the bodies 
below the plates terminate in a triangular piece, or flapper. In 
some of their movements it seems as if the two upper lobes had 
different wills, since sometimes one appears inclined to move to 
the right, and the other to the left, or one to move and the 
other to remain at rest ; but the lower lobes always move sim- 
ultaneously, either inwardly or outwardly. 

The animals that are found attached to the gills of other 
fishes are usually at their lower extremity furnished with sev- 
3k 



474 APPENDIX. 

eral suckers ; thus one genus* infesiiiig t lie gills of the sun' 
and sword fishes" has three; and another,* found in those of the 
tunny,^ has^za;, whence Cuvier would rather call it Hexastoma, 
But these are nothujg to those of our Diplozoon, which, ofi the 
four disks just named, has no less than sixteen suckers, four on 
each disk.^ Under a strong magnifier, these suckers when 
opened, for they can open and shut, exliibit a complex ma- 
chinery of hooks and other parts, by which their Creator has 
enabled them to take firm hold of the gills, so as not to be 
unfixed by their constant motion in respiration, especially when 
we consider their structure and substance. A further proof of 
this design is furnished by the form of the animal itself, for tlie 
body being divided upwards and downwards into two diverging 
lobes, it can fix itself at each extremiiy more firmly than if it 
was single, not only by having more points of attachment, but 
also by the divergement of its lobes, especially the lower ones. 
When a man wishes to stand as firmly aiid steadily as possible, 
he separates his legs so as to form a certain angle : and this is 
what its Creator has fitted our animal to do; and so by all 
these means it maintains its station on the lubricous, multifid, 
and constantly moving organs, from which it is coimnissioned 
to suck the blood. Probably these Diplozoons may be of the 
same use to the fishes they infest, as the horse-flies are to the 
animal from which they take their name. 

Dr Nordmann found this creature could exist submerged 
for three da5^s, during which period, its movements became 
gradually more feeble. One specimen, which he fed twice a 
day with fresh fishes' blood, lived nine days in water, and ap- 
peared to die at last from being too much handled. 

What can more evidently illustrate both the power, wisdom, 
and goodness of the Deity than this most extraordinary ani- 
mall How nicely is it formed, in every respect, to fulfil the 
functions given in charge to it ! How admirably is it secured 
against the mischances to which its singular situation exposes 
it ! When we see so much art and skill put in action to adapt 
such seemingly insignificant creatures, and so low in the scale 
of creation, to the circumstances in which they are placed ; so 
many contrivances, exhibiting the deepest intellect, taking the 
most comprehensive surveys of every possible contingency, and 

1 Tristoma. 2 Mola. 3 Xiphias. 

4 Polystovm. 5 Scomber Thijnnus. 

G Even this is nothing to those of a genus infesting some Cophalopods, 
Hectocotyle, tlie difierent species of which liave from sixty to more than one 
hundred Biickor*, w)»<'nro their name. 



I 



AI'PEJNDIX. 475 

rearing a structure calculafed to stand against every pressure 
upon it, — we must feel convinced that the attention of the 
Creator i? directed to every individual in existence, whether 
great or small, high or low, spiritual or material. To every 
thing that he created lie gave a law, the law of its nature ; a 
law emanating from Him, enforced by the physical powers 
acting upon certain structures, and producing certain necessary 
effects under His constant superintendence, direction, and ac- 
tion, on and by those powers. 

The intestinal worms, as well as some other parasitic ani- 
mals, are many of them so remarkable for the situation in 
which we discover them, that their transport to the spot where 
they are to exercise their function seems almost miraculous. 
How a mite should find its way into the human brain seems 
past our conjecture. We cannot clearly ascertain by what 
means the eye-worms are conducted to their assigned station, 
nor how the various species of tape-worm invariably select 
each its proper pabulum: tlje same holds good with regard to 
the cyst-worms,* or hydatids. Do they, like the Infernal Fury,^ 
as fabled by Linne, fall from heaven upon the earth and waters, 
and instantly bury themselves in their allotted animals'? But 
to spenk soberly, all we can safely affirm is, that He who de- 
creed the end decrees the means, and these probably are physi- 
cal ones under Ills direction. He it is who guides the punitive 
animals that he employs to their several stations. Is there not 
an omnipresent Deity, whose action is incessant, and co-exten- 
sive with his presence? He it is that, as the Prophet speaks, 
causeth it to rain upon one city, and not to rain upon another 
city ; that employs his instruments, both of benediction and 
punishment, according to his will. It is He, who by secret 
paths, and by means that mock our researches, conducts to 
their assigned station the animals in question. Every power 
of nature, every physical agent, is at His disposal. His is the 
earthquake and the volcano ; the lightning of the thunder ; the 
fire-damp of the mine ; the overwhelming violence of the 
water flood; the windy storm and tempest: His is the wide- 
wasting sword, that destroys myriads, and the pestilence that 
walketh in darkness, and carries off millions ; and He gives his 
commission to all his scourges against individuals as well as 
against nations, which they unconsciously execute and can- 
not exceed, for He saith to them, as to the raging sea. Hith- 
erto shall ye come and no further, and here shall the work of 
destruction cease. 

1 Cysticereui. 2 Furia infernalis. L. 



476 APPENDIX. 

We have a remarkable instance of this special guidance and 
employment of natural objects in the case of the prophet Jonah, 
when he disobeyed the word of the Lord. In the first place 
God sent out a great wind into the sea ; in the next he prepared 
a great fish to swallow him alive when he should be cast over- 
board, and at the Lord's command the same animal cast him 
upon the dry land. Next God prepared a gourd for a shadow 
against the heat ; after that he prepared a worm \vhich de- 
stroyed the gourd ; and in the last place he prepared a silent 
east wind,^ or a heat, like the sirocco, without sound. In all 
these cases the object employed was a physical object, under 
the immediate direction of the Deity. The wind, the fish, the 
gourd, the worm, the heat, were not new creations, but well 
known objects, acted upon to take a particular direction so as 
to produce particular events. 

By what is here said, I by no means assert the doctrine of 
inevitable fate, for then there would be no use in the employ- 
ment of means of prevention. Sir H. Davy's safety -lamp would 
not preserve the life of the miner, nor Dr. Franklin's conduc- 
tor disarm the thunder cloud ; and all the other means that, 
non sine Deo, have been invented to render harmless the action 
of the physical powers under certain circumstances ; but I 
would merely assert that constant superintendence of the Deity 
over the world that he has created, and Who upholdeth all things 
by the word of his power, which we call Providence, by which, 
in general as well as individually, his will has full accomplish- 
ment ; and every substance or being, whether animate or in- 
animate, takes the station which he has assigned to it. This 
is no miraculous interference out of the general course of na- 
ture, but the adaptation of that course to answer the wise pur- 
poses of Providence, which selects individuals, and distinguishes 
them from other individuals by events, as to this world, seem- 
ingly prosperous or adverse, but which have their ultimate 
reference to the spiritual world, and to their final destiny. As 
God willeth not that any should perish, so he withholdeth not 
from any the means, that, if duly used and improved, will bo 
sufficient for his salvation ; and in all his dealings with man- 
kind he hath this great and merciful object in view. 

1 n^vim Dnp nn- 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 



Note 1, p. 2. — The life and motion. The word life may per- 
haps here be used, in some sense, improperly ; but the original 
motion caused by the agency of the Spirit, and followed by 
Light and Expansion, may be called the birth, or beginning, of 
the life of the world, which followed, under the Divine Guid- 
ance, as a consequence of it. I speak only of animal life, not 
of spiritual, which resulted from the immediate insufflation, if 
1 may so use the term, of the Deity himself.^ 

I may here be permitted to observe that the Mosaic account 
of the beginning of creation, especially of the incubation of the 
Holy Spirit and its consequences, has been transplanted, by 
many oriental and occidental nations, into their cosmogonies. 
The circumstances and consequences of it have, in most cases, 
been altered from their original simplicity; and, in some, it has 
been assumed as a foundation, on which an Atheistic Philoso- 
phy has been erected amongst the Greeks. But when we 
consider attentively the terms in which these dogmata are 
delivered, and recollect that the Gods of the Greeks and Ro- 
mans, especially him who was invocated as the father of gods 
and men, were really the great elementary powers which 
under God govern the universe — whence Homer describes him 
as titBigct vcauv, and calls him zsys nc^tKnyipi^n?, and Ennius appeals 
to him in these terms, 

Aspice hoc sublime candens quern invocant omnes 
Jovem. 

And to live abroad is to live sub Jove, sub Dio. It is evident 
that these Gods were subsequent to Chaos, and sprung from 
that motion of the Spirit which first gave birth to this world 
as we behold it ; besides these, the sun, moon, planets, earth, 
ocean, &c. made part of the catalogue of false Gods whom 
the Heathens worshipped and served instead of the Creator. 
These powers, which were originally reverenced as symbols 

1 Gtrus. u. 7, comp. Johiif xx. 22. 



478 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

and representatives of the Godhead, and, as it were, his vice- 
gerents in Nature, in process of time were thus regarded and 
adored as the supreme and only God — the sign instead of the 
thing signified — the instrument instead of the hand that guided 
it — the work instead of the workman. They deemed, as the 
author of the Book of Wisdom observes,* Either fire, or icind, 
or the swift air, or the circle of the stars, or the violent water, or the 
lights of heaven, to be the Gods which govern the world. 

Veneration and love to those from whose actions or studies 
we derive great benefit, and respect for our ancestors, amiable 
motives when they do not lead us away from God, often induce 
mankind to throw a kind of Divinity, a ray of glory, around 
such persons ; first, perhaps, they are complimented with the 
title of suns of their people or race, and their wives as moons, 
and next we transform them into what we regarded as iheir 
symbol. So the Egyptians, in process of time, added the 
adjunct On, or the Sun, to the name of their great ancestor. 
Ham; whence he was afterwards designated as Hamon, or 
Ham the sun, and became the Jupiter Ammon of the Greeks." 

The idea of the incubation of the Spirit, of its being the prin- 
ciple of love that was in action, and that it produced the first 
motion, prevails, more or less, in all the cosmogonies. 

Aristophanes, in his ^ves, gives an account of the Grecian 
cosmogony, which proves that the heathen gods of the Greeks 
were all subsequent to the original creation of matter, in a pas- 
sage, of which the followinglinesare nearly a literal translation : 

Once Chaos was and Night, dark Erebus 
And ample Tartarus ; but Earth, and Air, 
And Heaven were not. First black-winged night 
In th' Infinite gulfs of Erebus brought forth 
The wind-nursed egg, from which in circling hours, 
Love the desired, his shoulders golden- winged, 
Sprung like a wind-swift vortex, he who mixed 
With Chaos winged and dark, and Turtarus wide 
Nested our race, and them brought first to liglit. 
Ere love commingled all, immortal Gods 
Were none, but from that commixture rose 
Heaven, Sea, and Earth, and Gods incorrvptildc. 

Wind-nursed egg. GY.vTDtvtjunov aov. Literally, the egg under 
the wind, alluding to the incubation of the Spirit. 

Love. This is the motion infused by the Spirit into the 
chaos which was followed by light and expansion, and the 

J Wisdom, xiii 2. U Cudworth, I. ii. IVJ8. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 479 

whole liannonious circle of creation, in which there was no 
discord, but ail was very good. 

His shoulders golden-winged. Gr. ^T/xCav ^u^ov Trhpv-yotv xf^o-xtv. 
Literally, his back shining witii two golden wings ; these two 
golden wings were, perhaps, light and the expansion, which car- 
ried love through his whole work. 

Spi'ung. G. ECKa.;iv, germinated. 

fVind-swift vortex. Gr. w^ac ctvejuccma-i iivAn. Literally, like 
whirlwinds or whirlpools, swift as the wind. 

He who mixed with Chaos winged and dark. Gr. oClos (Te x'^*' 
TrhfoiVTi fiiyug vuxia>. This describes love or motion entering into 
chaos and beginning to produce order. 

*N*ested our race. Gr. 'Enorlivfi yivo; »/4iTipov. The birds here 
claim an early origin. The allusion probably is to the mun- 
dane egg and the birth of winged love. 

But from that commixture rose heaven, sea, and earth, ^c. Gr. 

1v/UfA.iyvofXivciv <r' iTipcfV iTipoti;, iyiVir* apttvocy oksavo; ts, ka} yn, TrAVTcet 

Ti emv lucLnupav yiv(^ ct<^Qirov. Literally, "one thing being min- 
gled with another, heaven, ocean, and earth, and tjie incorrupt- 
ible race of all the immortal Gods were produced. 

It is evident from this passage that those whom the Greeks 
accounted their Gods were the elements, the heavenly bodies, 
and other works of creation. Thus they changed the truth of God 
into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the 
Creator, who is blessed for ever. 

Note 2, p. 3. — Kindred Monsters. I allude here to the gi- 
gantic Reptiles, those especially which are now seen only in a 
fossil state, many of which instead of legs are furnished with 
paddles ; as the Ichthyosauri and Plesiosauri. These animals 
seem intermediate between the amphibious Saurians and the 
Chelonians. Some of them also exhibit several characters in 
common with some of the Cetaceans, Amphibians, &c. 

Note 3, p. 5. — Intermediate, as it were, between matter and 
spirit, I find a similar idea in the Jfouveau DictionnaireD^His- 
toire J^aturelle,^ "he mot de matiere porte avec soi I'id^e d'un 
corps lourd et grossier: cependant il est des substances aux- 
quelles on donne le nom de matiere, telle que la matiere 
etheree, et qui sont d'une si inconceivable tenuite, qu'on diroit 
qu'elles tiennent le milieu entre Vesprit et la matiere." Sir Hum- 
phry Davy seems to have adopted a similar opinion, which I 
have given in another part of this work;'' and Dr Wollaston 

1 xix. 449. article Matihes. Patrin. 2 See above, p. 323. 



480 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

also, in his Religion of JSTature delineated, asks — ** Might it not 
be more reasonable to say, it (the soul) is a thinking substance 
intimately united to some fine material vehicle which has its residence 
in the brain T^^ And again — "If we should suppose the soul 
to be a being by nature made to inform some body, and that it 
cannot exist and act in a state of total separation from all body; 
it would not follow from thence, that what we call death, must 
therefore reduce it to a state of absolute insensibility, and inac- 
tivity, which to it would be equal to non-existence. For that 
body, which is so necessary to it, may be some fine vehicle 
that dwells with it in the brain, and goes oft' with it at death.® 
This vehicle, which is so necessary to the soul, dwells with it 
in the brain, and goes off* with it at death, he further supposes, 
is that by which it acts and is acted upon, by means of the 
nerves.' This vehicle seems not very different from the vital 
powers of modern physiologists, who regard the nervous power 
as their agent.* 

The Doctrine of a vehicle for the soul which accompanies 
her when separated from the body is not a modern hypothesis, 
but was held by the Platonists and many of the fathers.* 

Our Lord says to his disciples — The hairs of your head are 
allnumbered: upon which we may observe that the head of 
man is clothed with hair to answer a certain end, an end which 
has not yet been duly investigated, but which in Scripture has 
been intimated by making it the symbol of strength or power — 
by which latter term it is designated by St Paul^ — as in the 
case of Sampson, whose superhuman strength seems to have 
departed from him, when his seven locks were shorn off*; sym- 
bolizing might from the seven spirits of God,'' or in other words, 
the sevenfold might of the Spirit. It is well known that the 
hair is aff*ected by the electric fluid, and it may conduct it to 
the brain or other organs. Whatever be its function, however, 
its force will depend upon the quantity, and the quantity upon 
the number of conductors, and this God regulates in the case 
of individuals, according to circumstances, so that, though 
some receive more and some less. He that receives much has 
nothing over, and he that receives little has no lack.^ 

Note 4, p. 5. — For if the instinct of the predaceous ones was 



1 See above, p. 290. 2 Ibid. 293. 3 Ibid. 293. 

4 Dr Wilson Philip, in Philos. Tr. 1829, 271, 278. 

5 See Dr H. More, On the Immortality of the Soul, B. iii. Axiome xxvii 
and Cudworth's Intellectual Syst. 799. 

6 1 Cor. XI. 10. 7 Revel, i. 4, 5. 8 2 Cor. viii. 15. 



APPENDrX. NOTES. 481 

not restrained, they would soon have annthtlated the herbivorous 
ones, even if, as Lightfoot supposes, they were at first created by 
sevens. Ifihe fall of man, as is generally supposed, happened 
soon after liis crealion, tlie liryi, sacrifice, vvhicli as the Lord 
God clothed the first pair with skins before their expulsion from 
paradise, must have been oflered immediately after the foimer 
sad event, would have caused the annihilation of a species; 
which, in conjunction with the circumstance of Noah being 
directed to admit clean animals into tlie ark by sevens the male 
and his female, afforded no sliglit ground lor Lightfoot's suppo- 
sition alluded to in the text. He thus expresses his opinion.^ 
" Bestioe mundoi creatce sunt septence, tria paria ad prolem, et re- 
liqux singulce Adamo in sacrificium post lapsum : at immundce, tan- 
tum7nodo bince, ad generis propagationem.^^^ Lightfoot here 
speaks of three pairs and a half and some writers quoted by 
Poole, seem to think, that the same number were received into 
the ark, and that the seventh, a male, was intended for sacri- 
fice after the deluge; others think there were seven pairs. 

Note 5, p. 6. — In the fiercest enmity and opposition to each 
other. There was a show-man, who in the year 1831, ex- 
hibited on one of the London bridges, as I was informed by a 
friend upon whose accuracy I could rely, the animals here 
spoken of in a state of reconciliation. In one cage were cats, 
rats, and mice, and in another hawks and small birds living to- 
gether in the utmost harmony, and without any attempt on 
the part of the predaceous ones to injure their natural piey. 

Note 6, p. 9. — Concerning the kind of which interpreters 
differ. The Septuagint renders the Hebrew word cdjd, which 
our translation renders lice, by (rKvi<pic, which is supposed to mean 
the mosquito or gnat, but I cannot help thinking with Bochart,* 
that it rather means the louse, not only on account of its deri- 
vation from a root, p, which signifies to fix firmly, which 
agrees better with the animal just named than with the mos- 
quito, but also because it was produced from the dust of the 
earth like other apterous animals, and not from the waters, 
like the winged ones.^ The African negroes, as was before 
observed, have a peculiar louse.* 

Note 7, p. 10. — Geologists have observed, from the remains of 
plants and animals embedded in the strata of this and other north- 

1 Lightfoot, Opera, Ed. Leusden. i. 154. conf. 2. 

2 Hi€rozoic:574. 3 Genes, i. 21. 4 Fabr. Syst. .^ntliat.MO.2. 

3l 



482 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

em countries, that the climate must formerly have been warmer than 
it now is. That tlie inclination of the earth's axis was once 
different from what it now is was a very ancient opinion; but 
whatever might be the cause, the fact seems to have been cer- 
tain, from the existence in very high latitudes of the plants and 
animals here alluded to, such as various species of palms, of 
elephants, hippopotami, turtles, and similar tropical forms. 
Cuvier indeed has conjectured, that the carcass of a mammoth 
found in Siberia belonged to a cold climate because it was 
clothed with wool as well as hair. Its hair was stated to con- 
sist of three kinds. One being stiff black long bristles, another 
flexible hair of a leddish brown colour, and the third a reddish 
brown wool w^hich grew among the roots of the long hair.^ 
Now with respect to sheep, there is evidently a difference with 
regard to their coat in those that live in warm climates, and 
those that inhabit cold ones, the coat of the former usually 
consisting chiefly of hairs, and the latter of wool;'* but Dr 
Buckland,^ and Dr Virey^ have advanced some satisfactory 
arguments which prove that the Mammoth could not have 
existed in the countries in which its fos-sil remains are so abun- 
dant, if it had been exposed to a great degree of cold. It is 
remarked with respect to the remains of fossil elephants, which 
are so numerous without the tropics, in regions loo cold for 
their existence, that none have been hitherto found in those 
countries which they actually inhabit at the present time.* 
This throws no small degree of doubt upon that hypothesis 
which assigns them for their habitation the countries in which 
their remains are now deposited : but with regard to the re- 
mains of coral reefs^ found in the Arctic seas, no doubt can be 
entertained that at the period of their formation, those seas 
were warm enough to suit the temperature of the animals that 
formed them ; but which no longer exist and rear their struc- 
tures in those latitudes. I met with the following extract in 
the Literary Gazette for April 7, 1832 ; it is taken from a work 
entitled Six Months in JSTorth America, by G. T. Vigne, Esq. : 
"The fossil remains of about thirty animals, now supposed to 
be extinct, have been found at the Big-bone lick ; and Mr Bul- 
lock conjectures that there are more remaining. That these 
animals did not perish on the spot, but were carried and depos- 
ited by the mighty torrent, which it is evident once spread over 

1 Cuvier, Theory o/</tei:ar<A, by Jameson, 275. 2 See above, p. 35. 

3 Supplement to Captain Beechey's Voyage, ii. 355, 356. 

4 JV. D- D'H. J{. X. 162. 5 Ibid. 169. 
(5 Dr Buckland in the Appendix to Beechey's Voyoffe, ii, :i'Sr>. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 483 

the country, is probable from (he circumstance of marine shells, 
plants, and fossil substances having- been found not only mixed 
with the bones, but adhering to them, and tightly wedged in 
the cavities of the skull — Mhose holes where eyes did once 
inhabit,' were often stopped up by shells or pieces of coral for- 
cibly crammed into them." The bones of the Mastodon were 
found by Humboldt at an elevation of more than 7,000 feet 
above the sea, and in central Asia those of horses and deer 
have been met with at an elevation of 16,000.* 

Note 8, p. 11. — Burchel and Campbell appear to have met 
with more than one new species of rhinoceros in their journey from 
the Cape of Good Hope into the interior. Burcliel describes one 
under the name of Rhinoceros simus.^ Campbell's had a straight 
horn projecting three feet from the forehead, different from any 
he had seen, and its horn resembled that of the supposed uni- 
corn.'* There is in the Norwich Museum a horn flattened at 
the summit, nearly straight, and three feet long, which also 
seems to belong to another species. 

Note 9, p. 13. — The word of God, in many places, speaks of 
an abyss of waters under the earth. Scientific men in the present 
day seem to question this. The passages in Holy Writ, besides 
those quoted in the text, that appear evidently to affirm that 
an abyss exists in the earth, are chiefly the following. 

In the book of Genesis, in the blessings pronounced, both by 
Jacob and Moses,* previous to their death, upon the tribes of 
Israel, in that relating to Joseph, amongst others are mention- 
ed — The blessings of the deep that lieth under, or as the same 
words are more literally translated in Moses' blessing — The 
deep that coucheth beneath.^ The expression in these passages 
evidently alludes to an abyss under the crust of the earth, from 
which blessings may be derived : and which is emphatically 
described as couching beneath, as if the mighty waters it con- 
tained were lying in repose like a beast at rest, and chewing 
the cud, in contrast with the incessantly fluctuating and stormy 
ocean. 

When the children of Israel murmured for water in Rephi- 
dim, Moses at the Divine command smote the rock in Horeb, 
and water flowed out of it in a copious stream, which there is 
reason to believe followed them in all their wanderings through 

1 Quarterly Review, No. LVII. p. 155. 

2 Travels, ii. 75. Bulletin des Sc. Juin 1817. 96. 3 Travels, 295. 

4 Comp. Genes, xlix. 25 with Deut. xxxiii. 13. 5 Heb. nnn nxoi 



484 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

the wilderness. If we consider the nature of that dry and 
thirsty land tohere no water is,^ it is evident that this perennial 
stream could not be derived from the clouds that hovered round 
the summits of Mount Sinai, the rocks of that district were 
washed by no rivers derived from above, and seem not calcu- 
lated for percolation. But what was the case — the stroke of 
the wonder-woiking rod of the Lawgiver of Israel produced a 
fissure in the rock, which opened a channel through which the 
waters, before in repose in the great deep, rushed forth in a 
mighty stream; and therefore tlie Psalmist says — He clave the 
rocks in the wilderness, and he gave them drink, as out of the great 
abysses. Alluding evidently to a source of sioeet waters below. 
The prophet Jonah, in the prayer he uttered when incarce- 
rated in the fish's belly, has these words — I went down to the 
bottoms of the mountains : the earth with her bars was about me 
for ever.^ A parallel expression is used in Moses' song — A fire 
shall burn to the lowest hell — it shall set on fire the foundations of 
the mountains.^ This last passage shows that the Hades'^ of 
Scripture — usually translated Hell, but distinct from the Ge- 
henna or Hell of the New Testament — is synonymous with the 
abyss. As is further proved by the following passage of the 
book of Job. Hast thou entered into the springs of the sea ? Or 
hast thou walked in the search of the abyss ? Have the gates of 
death been opened unto thee, or hast thou seen the gates of the sha- 
dow of death ?^ In this passage the springs of the sea, the abyss, 
the gates of death, and the gates of the shadow of death, seem 
nearly synonymous, or to indicate, at least, different portions, 
of the womb of our globe. The bottomless pit, or rather the 
pit of the abyss of the apocalypse, also belongs to the same 
place : the word rendered pit means also a loell. Schleusner, 
in his lexicon, translates the phrase by Futeus seu fons abyssi, 
so that it seems to indicate a mighty source of waters. But as 
the terms abyss and great abyss are applied to the receptacle of 
waters exposed to the atmosphere, as well as to those which 
are concealed in the womb of our globe,^ it is evident that they 
form one great body of waters in connexion with each other. 

Note 10, p. 15. — He loho willed the deluge, and the destruc- 
tion of the primeval earth and heavens by it, <^c. When it is con- 
sidered that all the knowledge which we have, and can have, 
of the contents of the globe that we inhabit, is very superficial; 

1 See I Cor. x. 4. 2 Jonah, ii. 6. 

3 Dcut. xxxii. 22. 1 Heb. SiNC- 

5 Job xxxviii. 16, 17. 6 Job xli. 31. Ps. cvi. 9 Jsai. li. 10, &c. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 485 

that il is only, as it were, skin deep, and consequently very im- 
perfect, it seems as if we stood in great need of some otiier 
guide, besides our own reasonings and guesses upon the little 
that we can explore of ihe earth's crust, to enable us to form a 
correct' judgment, and to arrive at the truth as to what changes 
may have taken place in it, and by what means. When we 
further consider that we are informed by the highest authority, 
that the original earth and its heavens, with all their animal 
inhabitants — those only excepted, which, by his command, took 
refuge in a vessel built according to his direction — were de- 
stroyed by a universal deluge, which overtopped the highest 
mountains, and continued in force far nearly a year: when 
this great catastrophe is duly considered, surely, from the ac- 
count given of it in Scripture, much may be gleaned that will 
throw a light upon the subject, that can never be struck out 
by the unassisted investigations of the Geologist who can pene- 
trate so little below the earth's surface. 

My own knowledge of Geology and its principles, as now 
laid down, is too slight to qualify me to compare them with 
what has been delivered in Scripture on the subjects here al- 
luded to ; but as it appears to me that the scriptural account of 
the great Cataclysm has not been duly weighed, and its mag- 
nitude, duration, momentum, varied agency, and their conse- 
quences, sufficiently estimated by geologists, I will endeavour, 
as briefly as 1 can, to call their attention, and that of Christian 
Philosophers in general, to the most striking features exhibited 
by it, as stated in the seventh and eighth chapters of the book 
of Genesis, still requesting them to bear in mind these words 
of the poet, as expressing my own feelings. 

Fungor vice cotis exors ipse secandi. 

My only wish being to excite others better qualified, by their 
knowledge both of Scripture and Nature, the Word and the 
Work of the same Almighty Being, to undertake the task. 

It must be borne in mind that the scriptural account is not 
a. figurative one, in which the object is to represent one thing 
by another, but a statement of epochs, and naked facts; of 
causes and effects; in which all that is requisite is to ascertain 
the meaning of the terms employed to describe them. 

The cause of the universal deluge, every one is aware, was, 
with the exception of one family, the universal corruption of 
the human race. All flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.^ 
In consequence of which God determined to — Bring a flood of 

1 Genes, vi. 12. 



486 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh, wherein was the breath of 
life from under heaven; and every living substance from off the 
face of the earths To accomplish this purpose, it was evidently 
necessary that the whole globe should be submerged, and the 
tops of all the mountains covered to such a depth as to prevent 
any thing in which was the breath of life from making its 
escape. 

Having mentioned the cause and object of the deluge, we must 
next consider the means by which this universal destruction is 
stated to have been effected. Three only are mentioned. Jill 
the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows 
0/ heaven were opened, and the rain was upon the earth forty days 
and forty nights.^ 

1. All the fountains of the great deep were broken up. The 
radical idea of the word here rendered broken up is that of divi- 
sion or disruption, therefore the meaning is that those fountains 
by which the waters of the great abyss issued ordinarily upon 
the earth to water it by numerous streams and rivers, were so 
cleft, disruptured, and broken up, as to form vast chasms vom- 
iting up the fluid contents of the womb of the earth, and send- 
ing forth torrents of incalculable force and volume. The ves- 
tiges of such clefts in the earth's crust are still to be traced in 
many places. Malte Brun, in his Geography, observes, with 
respect to valleys — "Those which are found between high 
mountains are commonly narrow and long, as if they had ori- 
ginally been only fissures^ dividing their respective chains, or 
for the passage of extensive torrents. The angles of their direc- 
tion sometimes exhibit a singular symmetry; we see in the 
Pyrenees, says M. Raymond, some valleys whose salient and 
re-entrant angles so perfectly correspond, that if the force that 
separated them were to act in a contrary direction, and bring 
their sides together again, they would unite so exactly, that 
even the fissure would not be perceived."* 

2. The windows of heaven were opened — is stated by Moses to 
be the second cause by which the deluge was effected. The 
word,^ which in our translation of the Bible, is here and in 
other places rendered windows, does not mean an opening for 
the transmission of light, for which another term is usually 
employed." In the Septuagint and other ancient versions it is 
supposed to signify water falling from the heavens in large 
masses, and cataract or a corresponding term is used. 

1 Ge7iC5. vi. 17, and vii. 4. 2 Ibid. vii. 11. 

3 nyp^ is Hebrew for a valley, and ppaj is the verb used to expresi the 
disruption of the fountains of the great abyss. 

4 System of Geography, 1. i. 168. E.Tt. 5 nt3">K 6 y6n 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 487 

The radical idea is that of lying in wait, as a wild beast in 
its den. In other parts of Scripture it is used for dovecots or 
the holes in rocks that doves frequent ;* for the sockets of the 
eyes ;'' for the heavens when shedding copiously blessings or 
plenty f and for the action of something from above producing 
earthquakes.* 

My venerated friend, the late Rev. Wm. Jones, of Nayland — 
well known for his knowledge of the Hebrew, and the variety 
and ability of his researches on every subject connected with 
the interpretation of Scripture — in his Physiological Disquisi- 
tions thus expresses himself, concerning the term in question. 
"We suppose then that the air was driven downwards, for this 
purpose, through those passages which are called windows of 
heaven. These may seem very obscure terms to express such 
a sense by ; but heaven is the firmament^ or expanded substance 
of the atmosphere; and windows, as they are here called, are 
holes, or channels of any kind. Tlie same word is used for 
chimneys,^ through which smoke passes, and for the holes, 
probably cliffs of a rock, in which the doves of the eastern 
countries have their habitation."^ 

It strikes me as not very improbable that the term I am 
speaking of may allude to volcanoes and their craters, which may 
be called the chimneys of this globe, by w^hich its subterranean 
fires communicate with the atmosphere, and by which the air 
rushing into the earth, when circumstances are favourable, 
may possibly act the part of the fabled Cyclops, and blow 
them up previous to an eruption : thus they become literally 
channels or chimneys, through which the matter constituting 
the expanse or firmament passes, eiiher from heaven, or, in an 
eruption, towards heaven. The expression, in Isaiah, quoted 
above. The windoxos from on high'' are opened, and the foundations 
of the earth do shake — seems to indicate that earthquakes are 
connected with the opening of the windows of heaven, thus 
pointing to volcanic action as the result. Still the expression 
is ambiguous, and requires further elucidation : it may, how- 
ever, be intended to include both interpretations. The violent 
disruption of the fountains of the great deep, which appears to 
have been the first step towards producing the deluge, since 
God generally employs means to effect his purposes, was pro- 



1 Isai. \x. 8. 2 Eccles. xii. 3. 

3 2 Kings, vii. 2. Malachi, iii. 10- 4 Isai. xiiv. 18. 

5 Hosea, xiii. 3. 

6 Isai. Ix. 8. See Jones's Works, x. 264. See also Parkhurst, Heb. Lex. 
under aTM II. 7 Heb. onuo- 



488 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

bably occasioned by ibe expansive power of /tea/, and ibe same 
agent would, as it does at this very time in some countries, 
send out the waters, and it seems equally probable, that in 
proportion as the waters rushed out the air would rush in and 
take their place, and thus form a centre of repulsion, or vis cen- 
trifuga, to counteract the pressure of the superincumbent wa- 
ters. It seems not improbable, if this were the case, that in its 
transit from the surface of the earth, to its centre, the air might 
bring with it vast cataracts of water attended by thunder and 
lightning and other electric phenomena. 

Heat, the most elastic of all fluids, at the first creation, under 
the name of the expansion or firmament^ acting irj the bosom 
of the chaotic waters divided them, and therefore it is consist- 
ent with the Divine proceedings that the same mighty ele- 
ment should be put in action to bring them again together. 
And we learn from Scripture, that the same irresistible agent 
well be employed for the destruction of the present earth and 
its atmosphere or heavens, which are reserved unto fire, when the 
heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall 
melt with fervent heat ; the earth also and the works that are therein 
shall he burned up.^ As the opening of the windows of the 
heavens seems the consequence of the breaking up of the foun- 
tains of the great deep, it is therefore mentioned in the second 
place. 

3. The third instrument of Divine Power to produce the de- 
luge was rain. And the rain was upon the earth forty days and 
forty nights.'^ It is a common form of expression, — It rains as if 
heaven and earth would come together ; and this probably was 
the character of the rain that now fell for forty JSTycthemera, or 
entire days of twenty-four hours. A circumstance that does 
not require further explanation. 

By the united operation of these three mighty agents, guided 
by the Almighty hand of the Deity — Whose way is in the sea, 
and whose path is in the great waters, and whose footsteps are not 
known^ — the waters kept gradually rising and prevailing more 
and more, till they overtopped all the high mountains* that 
were under the whole heavens fifteen cubits,^ by which the 
Divine decree to destroy the earth with all its inhabitants, both 
rational and irrational, except those in the ark, was fully exe- 
cuted. With respect to the earth itself, when we consider the 

1 2PcMii.7, 10. 2 Genes, vii. }2. 3 P5. Ixxvii. 10. 

4 Genes, vii. ID. In our translation, onnn in this verse is rendered AtV/s, 
and in the 20th mouvtains. 
r. Ibid. 20. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 489 

violent action of the ascending and descending waters, and of 
the firmament rushing downwards ; the disruptions, dislocations, 
introversions, comminutions, deportations here and there of the 
original strata of the crust of our globe, can scarcely be con- 
ceived, and are still more difficult to calculate and explain 
exactly. In the waters thus again, as at the creation, masters 
of the whole earth, God had an instrument by which his will 
with respect to its crust, and the changes to take place in it, 
might have full accomplishment, especially when we consider 
the long time during which the waters kept rising or prevailed, 
till they reached the height necessary to fulfil the Divine decree. 
It seems not clear whether the forty days during which the 
rain fell are included in the hundred and fifty days that the 
waters are stated to have prevailed. If they were included, 
the period would be five lunar months and ten days; and if 
they were not, it would extend to six such months and twenty- 
two days. What a time, even according to the shortest cal- 
culation, for the continued action of such a body of fluctuating 
waters, continually increasing, till they left no peak or pinnacle 
of the most elevated mountains of the globe visible ! Who can 
calculate the effects of that action? 

During this period of the increase and prevalence of the wa- 
ters, when the mountains were covered, all ingress of the 
atmosphere into the earth by the chimneys of the volcanoes, if 
that is the meaning of stopping the windows of heaven, would 
cease ; and the abyss, at or before the end of it, no longer vomit 
forth its waters by its innumerable mouths. 

Having considered the secondary causes to which the Word 
of God attributes the rise and prevalence of the deluge, I must 
next make a few observations upon the means to which Divine 
Wisdom, Power, and Goodness had recourse to effect this, and 
to cause the waters to return to their ancient receptacle. At 
the first creation. The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the 
waters. The consequence of which was that order arose out 
of confusion. The motion was then begun, by which the wind^ 
bloweth where it listeth, the light shines forth, heat expands, 
the clouds are formed, and the physical cherubim, under the 
guidance, and according to the will of Jehovah of Hosts, are 
in action, and fulfil his purpose, and the consequence is that 
The waters under the heaven are gathered together into one plq>ce 
and the dry land appears,^ Similar steps were taken at the 

1 Avifjtot nJiv «r/ vrxnv a.iif) ■rows peai' oris eif^a. %<t.i yrviUfjLct, xiyirau. 
Ariatot. De Mundo. 2 Genes, i. 9. 

3m 



490 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

deluge. For God remembered JSToah and every living thing, and all 
the cattle that were with himinthe ark : and God made a wind to pass 
over the earth, and the waters assuaged.^ It is not here said, as 
on the occasion just alluded to, that the Holy Spirit brooded 
over the water, but literally that God passed (a) wind (or spirit) 
over the earth. The action, though not the same, was ana- 
logous, wind under the direction of God was employed to do, in 
part, what the incubation of the Holy Spirit had before effected, 
to begin that action by which the globe and its atmosphere 
would be again placed in statu quo, the water again divided, so 
that one part should return to the great abyss, its destined 
abode ; and the other be suspended in the atmosphere ; and, 
by the same means, the dislocated crust of the earth be re- 
formed ; the matter suspended in the water or floating on it 
deposited, the detritus of the old one being mixed, and often, 
as it were, intercalated with vegetable and animal substances 
and remains. This wind from God having passed over the 
earth, the waters assuaged ; that is, their rage and violence 
ceased ; the fountains of the abyss and the windows of heaven 
being stopped ; the one no longer poured forth its waters upon 
the earth ; and the other no longer descended to occupy their 
place; and the rain had ceased to fall. When the above three 
causes of the deluge ceased their action, and had given place to 
the wind from God, the waters of course began to subside. 

We are now arrived at the last epoch of this great event, the 
gradual decrease and final subsidence of the diluvial waters. 
The period of their increase, if with Lightfoot we add the 40 
days to the 150, would be 190 days, or, as was before observed, 
six lunar months and about three weeks. In the seventh month 
of the deluge, as the same author observes,^ on the seventeenth 
day of the month, the ark rested on the mountains of Ararat,* 
from which period the waters returned off the face of the earth, 
going and returning, as it is in the Hebrew,* rendered in our 
translation by the word continually, but almost all the ancient 
versions adhere to the literal sense, which seems to be impor- 
tant, and to indicate a flux and reflux of the waters, which 
would affect the deposition of the matters floating upon or 
suspended in them. Whether this flux and reflux partook of 
the nature of a tide, and was produced by the action of the 
moon, or whether it was occasioned by the wind, which, as 
Solomon observes, Goeth towards the south and tumeth about to 
the north,^ does not appear. 

1 Genes, viii. 1. 2 Uhi siipra. 3 Sec above, p. 25. 

4 lltb. aiB'T "ytbry xnNn Syo o>Dn nB"> 5 EcUcf. i. 6. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 491 

After the resting of the ark, more than two months elapsed 
before the tops of the mountains were seen, and finally, in nearly 
two months more the waters liad universally disappeared; and 
after their long domination over the earth, lasting nearly,'eleven 
months, were confined again within the limits that God had 
originally assigned to them. Reckoning to the day of Noah's 
going out of the ark, on the twenty-seventh day of the second 
month, the whole period of his confinement appears to have 
been one year and ten days. It is evident, from the period that 
intervened between the resting of the ark, and the subsequent 
emergence of the tops of the mountains more than two months 
afterwards,^ that the subsidence of the waters at first was very 
gradual ; but, in proportion as their volume diminished, it 
probably became more and more rapid. 

The tumult and violence of the descending waters, and the 
effects produced by them, in the new mixture, as it were, of 
the substances now forming the crust of our globe, and the 
putting it into its present order — always under the direction 
and guidance of the Deity, who sitteth above the water-flood, 
employing as his hands those physical agents which rule in 
nature, to fulfil his purpose — must have been the reverse of 
those of the ascending ones : the object now was not disruption, 
and dislocation, and destruction, but to form anew the earth 
and its heavens which had been thus destroyed, and by the 
addition of a vast body of fresh materials not entering into the 
composition of the old crust of the former, to render it materi- 
ally different from it ; and that when the attention of mankind 
was directed to the study of God's works, and of those remains 
of the former world, a proof might be supplied of the existence 
of this sad catastrophe, confirmative of the account given in 
Holy Scripture, and adding to the force of the warning that 
universal corruption will be a prelude to universal destruction. 

When we consider what an infinite host of animals of every 
description must have perished in the diluvial waters, as well 
as the incalculable magnitude of the mass of vegetable sub- 
stances that must have been severed by the violence of the 
conflicting waters from the earth's surface, or uprooted after- 
wards in consequence of its being so thoroughly soaked by them, 
we see immediately that their deposition and sepulture, as well 
as the putting together again of the dislocated remains of the 
primeval earth, must have been an important part of the office 
of the subsiding waters, upon which 1 shall now offer a few ob- 
servations. 

1 Genes, v'ni. 4,5, 



492 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

It has been a matter of surprise that amidst so many fossil 
animals which are daily brought to light, and those of some 
of the largest quadrupeds in great numbers/ no remains of the 
human race have yet been discovered, except in one or two soli- 
tary instances. As the deluge was caused by the wickedness 
of these old giants, as they have been called, but really apos- 
tates,^ these men of renown, it was evidently a miraculous inter- 
ference of the Deity for their punishment; it seems, therefore, 
by no means improbable, that the place of their burial was not 
left to chance, or the uninfluenced action of physical causes, 
but, like the burial place of Moses, was decreed by God, and 
fixed so as to be placed beyond discovery. 

It seems to have been the opinion of most modern geologists, 
that fossil animals in general were natives of those districts or 
countries in which their remains have been discovered. But 
whoever takes into consideration the account, above detailed, 
which the sacred writings give us of the universal deluge, and 
of the prevalence of the waters above the summits of the high- 
est mountains, will see at once, with the exception of those 
that were overtaken and drowned by the waters in dens or 
caverns, they must have floated when the waters had reached 
and flooded all the elevations upon which they had taken their 
last refuge, and they would have drifted off" north or south, or 
in any other direction the fluctuating element was taking, and 
if there was an alternate flux and reflux, they would have 
been carried by it backwards and forwards till they were de- 
posited some here and some there ; some upon mountain sum- 
mits,3and others at different heights ruled by the circumstances 
of the earth's surface and the action of the subsiding waters. 
Few, indeed, would be imbedded in their native country, except 
those that perished, as above mentioned, in caverns; though 
probably, in many cases, those of the same species might con- 
gregate, and so floating off* together might be buried together. 
It has been remarked that no fossil elephants have been found 
in the countries that those animals now frequent. It seems, 
therefore, by no means certain that the gigantic Saurians now 
found in our southern coasts, or that the Mammoths or other 
gigantic Pachyderms of Northern Russia or Nova Zembla, 
were really natives of those regions. 

What Geologist, then, however practised, however deeply 
conversant with his subject, can estimate and exactly calculate 

1 See RdiquicB. Diluv. 138—182. 2 See Ileb. 

3 See above, p. 463. 



1 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 493 

the action and operation of these mighty waters, both during 
their rise, prevalence, and subsidence for so extended a period ; 
especially when those of an Almighty superintending and di- 
recting Cause, upon the whole body of means that he employed 
to accomplish his purposes, and execute his decrees wilh regard 
both to the destruction and renovation of our globe, are duly 
considered 1 

By what I have here argued I no not mean to contend that 
there may not have been ma.ny partial convulsions which may 
have produced very important changes in difierent countries of 
our globe : it is not moreover at all improbable that while its 
population was concentrated, many regions when uninhabited, 
God so willing, by diluvial, volcanic, or other action of the 
elements, might be materially altered, new mountain ridges 
might be elevated, mighty disruptions take place, and other 
changes to which there could be no witnesses, but which can 
only be conjectured by the features such countries now exhibit. 

Note 11, p. 22. — We learn from the *^postle St Peter, that the 
primeval globe, audits heavens or atmosphere, perished at the deluge. 
I shall add a few words here on the passage of St Peter alluded 
to in the text. Speaking of the scoffers of the last days, and 
of the deluge. Whereby, he says, the world that then was being 
overflowed with water perished : he adds, But the heavens and earth, 
which are now, by the same word are kept in store, &c. In this 
passage it must be observed that the term world in the sixth verse 
is synonymous with the heavens and the earth taken together 
of the fifth and seventh verses, and by it seems to be meant 
that the earth with its own heavens, or the atmosphere that 
surrounds it, both perished or were destroyed,^ which is rendered 
further evident by the expression : But the heavens and earth 
which are now. From which it may be gathered that the 
heavens and earth which are now, are different from the heavens 
and earth which were destroyed at the deluge ; and as the lat- 
ter has evidently been reconstructed, and vegetable and animal 
remains have been mixed with the dislocated materials and as 
it were detritus of the original world f so the new atmosphere 
might be, and probably was differently mixed, so as to be less 
friendly to health aad longevity, which would account physi- 
cally for the gradual reduction of the former extended period of 
human life to its present brief standard. Animals as well as 
man might be affected by this change, their bulk might be di- 

1 Gr. arotxtro. 

2 See above, p. 490, and Herschel in Cab. Cyclop, xiv. 141. No. 135. 



494 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

minished, and other variations be produced in them which have 
not been ascertained. When God fixed upon the rainbow as 
the token of his covenant with Noah, the changes, here alluded 
to, in the atmosphere might be the cause of the appearance, 
under certain circumstances, of that phenomenon. 

Scientific men have judged it not improbable, without refer- 
ring to this doctrine of Revelation, that changes in the compo- 
sition of the atmosphere, according to circumstances, may have 
taken place.^ 

Note 14, p. 29. — Whoever examines the animals of J^orlh 
America will find a vast number that correspond with European 
species — on the Rocky Mountains^ and in the country westward of 
that range Asiatic types are discoverable. The rein-deer, the fox, 
the weasel, the rat, the mouse, the golden eagle, the peregrine 
falcon, and many other birds are of the former description. In 
the latter paragraph I allude to a fine Carabus,^ which is found 
in Siberia; and likewise to a new genus^ related to Trechus, of 
which I possess a specimen, found in India, both taken also in 
the Rocky Mountains. Mr Sabine informed me that several 
new PoBonias, and a Laurus that reached the height of six(y 
feet, were natives of the same country. In Chili, Molina found 
the green and temporary frogs, the heron, the turtle-dove, and 
several other old-world animals. 

Note 15, p. 30. — But which in their immediate or remote con- 
sequences, may be productive of effects that are important to be 
attended to, and provided for. When we reflect upon the action 
of the Deity, we can scarcely avoid taking our ideas of it, in 
some degree from that of man. Man's attention is usually 
directed to things that appear to him important, as affecting 
either his passions or his interests, but he passes by those that 
appear to him trivial, as having no bearing upon his pain, or 
pleasure, or welfare. But here there is a great difference, for 
though some 

By long experience do attain 

To something like prophetic strain, 

the generality can trace the chain of causes and effects, but for 
a very few links ; and therefore they disregard some things as 
trivial, which, in the event, produce effects of the greatest im- 
portance. But it is not so with God ; he sees the most distant 
consequenc^sof every thing that happens in his whole universe, 

1 ^nn. Dca Sc. I^al.x'xx. iZ2. 2 C. Victinghovii. Fisch. 

3 hopUurus. K. M. IS. 



•, 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 495 

and therefore knows exactly in what proportions every thing 
appertaining to the nature of every creature should be mea- 
sured out to it in order to produce the effects he intends should 
take place, if I may so speak, during its ministration ; so com- 
bining agents and actions, as may infallibly fulfil his law, and 
general purpose. He foresees the effect of what are regarded 
as the most trivial things, as the number of our hairs and the 
death of a sparrow, as well as of those that are most important: 
and his general object is to provide for the execution of the 
laws both physical and metaphysical by which he governs the 
universe, and so upholds all things, but not so as never to sus- 
pend the action of these laws. The following events recorded 
in Scripture were remarkable instances of such suspension. 

1. The Universal Deluge, by the means of which the heavens 
and the earth of the primeval world were destroyed. 

2. The Egyptian palpable darkness for three days and nights. 

3. The passage of the Israelites through the Red Sea, the 
waters standing as a wall on either hand. 

4. The sun apparently standing still in the heavens at the 
command of Joshua, or the earth ceasing to revolve on its 
axis. 

5. The shadow going back on the dial of Ahaz three degrees, 
or the earth retrograding. 

6. The supernatural darkness that took place at our Saviour's 
crucifixion. 

Note 16, p. 46. — Which will take place in his time and at his 
word; and by the means and instruments that he empowers and 
commissions. Ever since the fall of our first parents a copious 
harvest of evil and sorrow, the fruit of sin, has been reaped by 
their descendants, amongst others, that of slavery has been one 
of the bitterest. In the case of Ham it was predicted and de- 
creed by the Deity himself that his son Canaan should be a 
servant of servants or slave to his brethren, a prediction which, 
to judge by the event, affected all the descendants of the of- 
fending patriarch, for no races have been so much degraded, 
in all respects, as the African negroes who derived their origin 
from him. 

Much has of late been done with the view of ameliorating 
their condition, and most of the European nations have con- 
curred in the benevolent endeavour. In consequence of the 
exertions of this country, the debasing trafllcin slaves, and the 
miseries and waste of human life that it occasioned, have been 
very much diminished. But though Christian nations have 
agreed to rehnquish the trade in slaves, and it is to be hoped 



496 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

that many of the wars that were expressly kindled amongst 
the Africans themselves, for the purpose of making slaves will 
cease : still there are markets for slaves that we have no power 
to close, and therefore it is to be apprehended that the good 
expected from the abolition, by European states, of the traffic 
in question, will not be altogether realized : so that it still 
seems doubtful whether slavery is near its extinction, or whether 
it ever will be extinguished during the present state of society, 
and while the nations amongst whom it is practised continue 
to be apostates from the knowledge and worship of their Crea- 
tor. While the souls of the sons of Adam are thus enslaved 
and sold under sin, it seems improbable that God's time for 
their general emancipation from bodily slavery should be at 
hand ; but when their heart shall turn to the Lord, this, and 
numberless other evils, at his bidding, and by instruments that 
he appoints, will cease. The best way therefore of accom- 
plishing this obiect is by providing means, wherever God has 
made an opening, for the education of the negroes, and for 
training them to habits of industry and order : to give them 
freedom before they are qualified to use it for the benefit of so- 
ciety, is giving them not a boon, but a curse. 

Note 17, p. 46. — Should another and last cloud of error en- 
velope the world with darkness. There are many passages of 
Holy Writ, from which it appears that, before the final triumph 
of the gospel, there shall be a time of great spiritual darkness 
upon earth ; and it seems also to be intimated that this reign 
of evil shall be brought on by men that Despise dominion, and 
speak evil of dignities,^ who shall promise liberty to their follow- 
ers, while they themselves are the servants of corruption;^ who 
shall resemble Corah, and his companions in rebellion Dathan 
and Abiram,^ and rise up against their civil and ecclesiastical 
rulers ; and who shall for a time prevail against them, as seems 
to be intimated by one of the most ancient prophecies in the 
Bible. Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, 
that biteth the horse-heels, so that his rider shall fall backwards 
So says the venerable patriarch, in his valedictory and prophetic 
address to his twelve sons before his death. These words seem 
to foretell that serpents, or apostates, symbolized by the tribe 
of Dan, would, in the last times, incite the lower orders to rebel 
against their governors and reject their authority ; and when 
Jacob adds / have waited for thy salvation, JcJiovah, it seems 

1 Jude, 8. 2 2 Pet. ii. 9, 19. 

3 J^umb. XTi. 1—3, 31—35. 4 Genes, xlix. 17. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 497 

to be further indicated that this event will be followed by the 
great day of salvation. It was an ancient opinion that Anti- 
christ would be an individual of the tribe of Dan, who, in the 
last times, to use the words of Irena^us, would leap like a lion 
upon the human race ;* an opinion probably derived from this 
prophecy, or from that of Moses dehvered on a similar occasion, 
Dan is a lion's whelp: he shall leap from Bashan;^ and from the 
exclusion of that tribe from the number of those that were 
sealed, as recorded in the Apocalypse. ^ St Paul, in his de- 
scription of the man of sin, describes him as exalting himself 
above all that is called God, or that is worshipped or venerated.* 
This has been interpreted as meaning idols, but in Scripture 
princes and rulers are called Gods, as when it is said Thou shall 
not revile the Gods nor speak evil of the ruler of thy people;^ 
whence it seems as if St Paul meant to indicate a power that 
was to exalt itself above all authority whether civil or eccle- 
siastical. Irenaeus expected liis personal Antichrist to reign 
three years and a half, interpreting the prophetic period of 1260 
days literally f but this period, if interpreted a year for a day, 
would only agree with a succession of individuals. The an- 
cient opinion of a personal Antichrist, may be reconciled with 
the modern one of a succession of individuals entitled to that 
appellation, by considering St John's prophecy of the two wit- 
nesses. They are to prophecy clothed in sackcloth 1260 days.^ 
This period synchronizes with the reign of the Antichristian 
power which corrupts the gospel, headed by a succession of indi- 
viduals. Again, they are to be killed, and their bodies exposed 
without sepulture in the street of the great city for three days 
and a half ;^ this second period synchronizes with the reign of 
the personal Antichrist, who denies the gospel, who is to be a 
single individual; and more particularly entitled to the name 
of Antichrist by his infidelity, and atheistic principles. He is 
the Antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son.^ It may be 
asked — When God doeth this, who shall be able to standi will any 
Christian church escape 1 We learn from the case of that of 
Philadelphia,^^ that if any such church holds fast her profession, 
has kept the word of Christ, and not denied his name, though 
beset by a host of enemies, she shall be kept from the hour of 
temptation. 



1 


Mv. HcBres. 1. iii. 


c. 38. 


2 


Deut. xxxiii. 22. 


3 


Revel, xvi. 5—8. 




4 


Gr. n^cKTiAA, 2 Thess. ii. 4. 


5 


Exod. xxii. 28. 




6 


Ubi supr. 1. V. c. 25. 


7 


Revel, xi. 3. 




8 


Ibid. 7—11. 


9 


1 John, ii. 22. 

3n 




10 


Rev. iii. 7—10. 



498 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

Note 18, p. 46. — And be restored to the favour of their God 
and their own land. Some Divines have thought that there 
will be no restoration of the Jews to their own land ; but as it is 
evident, from what St Paul says, that they will at a period fixed 
in the Divine counsels be converted to the faith of Christ,^ so 
it appears equally clear, from what is foretold in the conclud- 
ing chapters of Ezekiel and by other prophets,^ that they shall 
also again inhabit Jiidea and Jerusalem. Some interpreters 
are also of opinion, that the pouring out of the vial of the sixlli 
angel upon the river Euphrates and the drying up of its waters,' 
signify the dissolution of the empire of the Turks ; that, by the 
Kings of the East therein mentioned, are meant the Jews; 
and that their return to their own land is indicated, by their 
way being prepared. Bishop Horsley supposes, likewise, thai 
the eighteenth of Isaiah foretells this event, and that the great 
commercial nation of the day will be instrumental in bringing 
it about.* 

St Paul's conversion is thought to have been a type of the 
conversion of the Jewish nation in the latter days, and as his 
zeal und success seem to have exceeded that of the other apos- 
tles, and he was the great instrument of the conversion of the 
gentile world to the faith of Christ, so it has been supposed 
that the Jews when converted, will be the main instruments of 
the conversion of the then heathen world. 

Note 19, p. 48. — Unless some means can be devised at home, 
by which the pressure may be lightened, and the suffering classes be 
enabled to procure the necessaries of life. There are two mighty 
nations on our globe in which a system has long been acted 
upon, enabling them to support a population, never diminished 
by foreign wars, greatly exceeding that of any other country, 
whose numbers have only been diminished occasionally by 
famine, by devastating inundations and unfavomable seasons, 
from which nothing can altogether insure a people. The na- 
tions I allude to are China and Japan. We are informed, in 
the account of Lord Macartney's Embassy, that in the former 
of these countries, "Every square mile contains upon an ave- 
rage one third more inhabitants, being upwards of three hun- 
dredy than are found upon an equal quantity of land, also upon 



1 Rom. xi. 25, 26. 

2 Ezek. xxxvii. &c. Isai. Ix. Jerem. xxx. &Ai. 

3 Rev. xvi. 12. comp. ix. 14. 

4 See also Ix. 8, 1), and Zcph. iii. 10. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 499 

an average, in the most populous country in Europe."* The 
population of the latter is also stated to be prodigious.^ The 
encouragement of Agriculture appears to be the sole mean 
which enables these countries to maintain so vast a mass of 
population. In China, it is stated, that the whole surface of 
the country is dedicated to the production of food for man alone, 
that even the steepest mountains are brought into cultivation; 
they are cut into terraces, and the water that runs at their feet 
is raised by chain-pumps, worked each by two men, from ter- 
race to terrace, to irrigate them ; and steep and barren places 
are not suffered to run waste, but are planted with pines and 
larches.' A similar account is given of the state of agriculture 
in Japan, where attention to it is enjoined by the laws as one 
of the most essential duties; and if any one leaves his land un- 
cultivated his more active neighbour may take possession of it. 
In both these countries no article that can possibl/ be used as 
manure is wasted, so that the soil and crops have every possi- 
ble attention of this kind.* Malte-Brun has given a very inter- 
esting account of the honours paid by the Emperor of China 
and his court to agriculture : who annually in the beginning 
of March, after adoring the God of Heaven, and invoking his 
Blessing on his labour and on that of his whcie people, himself, 
laying aside his imperial robes, holding a plough opens several 
furrows, and is succeeded by his chief matdarins, who in suc- 
cession, follow the example of the prince.^ Some allowance 
probably must be made for too warm colouring in these state- 
ments, as most of them must have been derived from the report of 
the natives, yet there seems no doubt with respect to their gen- 
eral accuracy. What an example is here set by nations which 
we aie accustomed to consider as far behind ourselves in every 
art of life : how vast a portion of oi/r own home empire is suf- 
fered to lie waste, while all the tin:e hundreds of thousands of 
our agricultural population are languishing for want of employ- 
ment, and compelled to live upjn a pittance, which, unless 
they add to it by theft or frauJ, is scarcely sufficient to keep 
body and soul together ; and in the mean while the morals 
of our peasantry are gradually corrupted ; they grow daily less 
industrious ; they will often congregate at the beer-shops, and 
get inveterate habits of intemperance ; they lose all respect for 



1 Macartney Embassy by Sir G. Staunton, iii. 388, 

« Malte-Brun. Syst. of Geogr. Asia IT. ii. 533. E. T. 

3 Macartney Embassy, iii. 386. Malte-Brun. Asia, 560. 

4 Thumb. Japan, iv. 82. Malte-Brun. 561. 

5 Malte-Brun, 561. 



500 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

their superiors, and the bonds of union betwixt the upper and 
lower classes are graduall}^ dissolving ; and unless some remedy 
for this fearful evil is soon discovered, who can say what the 
consequences may be ? When a man once loses liis self-esteem, 
and is degraded from his natural dependence upon himself, 
under God, and (belabour of his hands, for the support of him- 
self and family, being no longer of use to himself or others, he 
becomes careless of his actions; and being, as itweie, rejected by 
society, becomes the enemy of those above him, and the ready 
associate of evil men, in evil works. 

Note 20, p. 84. — -Those that are loricated and covered with 
some kind of shell. The varied means by which a provident 
and beneficent Creator has provided animals with different 
means of defence ought not to be overlooked. When we see 
even these Invisible atoms as it were provided with armour, to 
defend them probably from the attack of animals of their own 
class, we feel confident that he v/ill not neglect us. This dis- 
tinction of animals into loricated and naked may be traced 
through most of their Classes; thus the Coleoptera stand in con- 
trast with most of the other Orders of insects; the fishes and 
reptiles that are covered with scales with those that are covered 
with skin.* In biids, however, this distinction does not appear 
to obtain at all: in quadrupeds the giant Megatherium, the ^/Ir- 
madilloy the Chlamy^horus, and the Manis, are distinguished 
from the other Mammalians by the armour that protects them. 

Note 21, p. 87. — The first plants and the first animals are 
scarcely more than animoded molecules, and appear analogues of 
each other; and those ahou them in each kingdom represent jointed 
fibrils. A discovery may here be noticed of one of the most 
scientific Botanists of the piesent age, and whose keen eye and 
philosophic spirit have penetrated into depths and mysteries 
before unexplored, belonging to the science of which he is so 
great an ornament. In the investigation of some of these, he 
discovered that not only vegetable, but even mineral molecules, 
when placed in a fluid medium^ would move about in various 
directions, but by what cause these motions were generated 
he offers no conjecture. He very kindly showed me this sin- 
gular phenomenon, if my memory does not deceive me, with 
respect to some mineral substances. Mr Brown has observed 
that the motions in question, he was satisfied, arose neither 

1 In some fishos tho scales arc invisible, so that they may be almost 
reckoned naked: Sec above, p. 351. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 501 

from currents in the fluid, nor from its gradual evaporation, but 
belonged to the particle itself ;i and of the spherical molecules 
mixed with the other oblong particles obtained from Clarckia 
pulchella, that they were in rapid oscillatory motion f in both 
mineral,^ vegetable,* and animal substances,^ along with the 
molecules, he found other corpuscles, like sliort fibres some- 
what monihform, or having transverse contractions, correspond- 
ing in number, as he conjectured, with that of the molecules 
composing them : and these fibrils, w^hen not consisting of a 
greater number than four or five molecules, exhibited motion 
resembling that of the mineral fibrils, while longer ones of the 
same apparent diameter were at rest.^ It does not appear 
clearly from the words of the learned author, whether the mo- 
tion of the mineral molecules was similar to that of the vegeta- 
ble ones, which he describes as oscillatory. The motions of 
the mineral fibrils, when not composed of more than two or 
three molecules, were at least as vivid as those of^the simple 
molecule, and which from the fibril often changing its position 
in the fluid, and from its occasional bending, might be said to 
he somewhat vermicular;'' now vermicular movement is a kind 
of progressive oscillation, the anterior extremity going from side 
to side and being followed by the body. In other mineral bodies, 
as in white arsenic, which did not exhibit the fibrils, he found 
oval particles about the size of two molecules, which he con- 
jectures to be primary combinations of them: their motion, 
which was more vivid than that of the simple molecule, con- 
sisted usually in turning on their longer axis, and then often 
appearing to be flattened.^ The revolution of a body upon 
its axis, it may be observed, implies the action upon it of 
two equal conflicting forces, by the counteraction of which the 
revolution is produced and maintained : the same action on the 
longer fibrils^ would keep them at rest. 

My motive for introducing a topic, which, at the first blush, 
seems to have a very slight connexion with the subject now 
before me, was a suspicion that sometimes Mr Brown's mole- 
cules may have been mistaken for Infusory Anwials. Com- 
paring the oscillatory motion he observed in them, and Carus's 
observation that the motions of Infusories occasionally present 
the appearance of attraction and repulsion, ^° this suspicion seems 
to merit attention, and to call for more close examination ; and it 
may be observed that the action of these two powers seems 

1 Brief Account of Microscopical Observations, ^c. 4. 

2 Ibid. 5, 6. 3 Ibid. 10. 4 Ibid. 11. 5 Ibid. 

6 Ibid. comp. 10, 11. 7 Ibid. 10. 8 Ubi supra. 

9 Ibid. 11. 10 Introd. to Comp. Mat. E. Tr. i. 45. § 57. 



502 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

sufficiently to account for the oscillatory motions of the mole- 
cules, and takes away all idea of any spontaneity. With regard 
to the Infusories this has been most satisfactorily established 
in a former part of this chapter/ and this clearly proves their 
animal nature, as do their modes of motion, &c.* but when we 
recollect that they abound in vegetable infusions, and that the 
more vegetables are macerated, and as it were decomposed, 
the more numerous are the animalcula that they appear to give 
out when infused, it would be nothing extraordinary either that 
they should be mistaken for moving molecules, or moving mole- 
cules for them. Farther we may observe a kind of analogy 
between the spherical Infusories and the Molecules, and between 
the filiform ones transversely annulated with a vermicular 
motion, and the fibrils of Mr Brown. 

Another law of nature seems to result from the experiments 
of this acute naturalist — that all bodies whether organized or 
inorganized, are formed, as fibrin is in the animal kingdom, by 
spherical molecules made, as it were, into necklaces, and then 
adhering in bundles, and that these are the substratum of all 
substance. In fluids the spherules are not united, and so have 
free motion inter se. 

Note 22, p. 106. — Several of them, for U is not common to them 
all, when touched cause a sensation similar to that produced by the 
sting of a nettle. Aristotle mentions a marine animal, under 
the name of Acaleph^,^ and another, if it be not the same, 
under that of Cnide,^ both of which words, according to the 
Creek lexicographers, are used to designate the same plant, 
•the stinging-nettle ;* but it seems not quite certain that, in 
either case, he had the stinging Gelatines or sea-nettles in his 
eye. Describing his Acalephe, he says, " It adheres to the rocks, 
as do some of the shell-fish, but sometimes it roves at large. 
It has no shell, but the whole body is fleshy. If the hand 
is moved to it, it perceives, seizes, and adheres to it, like the 
Polype, by means of its tentacles,^ so that the flesh swells. 
It has its mouth in the middle, and the rock seems to serve it 
for a shell : if it meets with any of the small fishes, it detains 
them in the same way that it does the hand. Thus \\#\atever 
edible thing it meets with, it devours. One kind of them is at 
large, and devours whatever sea-urchins,^ or cockles,® it meets 

1 See above, p. 81. 2 Jbid. 82. 

3 Gr. AxetKn<pH, Aulus Gelliua {JVoct. Att. 1. iv. c. 11.) writes it Ajt*xw^ 

4 Gr. Kj-zcT*. f) Hcschius explains AKctxnipni l>y KttSdj. 
C Gr. irMjcTAVct/. 7 E;^/vo/. 8 Gr. «Tirif. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 503 

wilh : it appears to have no excrement, in this respect resem- 
bling plants. There are two kinds of Jlcalephes; one smaller, 
and best adapted for the table; the other large and hard, such 
as are produced about Chalcis. In the winter their flesh is 
Ann — they are therefore caught and eaten at that season — but 
in summer they dissolve, for they become watery, and when 
touched they immediately are so damaged as not to be remov- 
able.* When suffering from the heat they withdraw within 
the rocks."^ And again — "It has a mouth in the middle, 
which is chiefly conspicuous in the large ones ; it has,Uike the 
l)ivalve shell-fish, a passage by which the excrements are 
voided, which is in their upper surface : like them too it has 
the fleshy part within, but it uses the rock as a shell."^ 

With regard to his Cnide, of which ho treats at the same 
time with the sponges, as inhabiting the caverns of the rocks 
—he says, " Of the Cnides there are two kinds, one in the hol- 
lows, which adheres to the rocks ; others, that range at large, 
are met with in smooth places,* and on the flat shore."^ 

It seems not accordant with the usual accuracy of this great 
Philosopher and Naturalist, where he is treating formally of 
the same kind of object, to distinguish it by two different names, 
nor is it hkely that he would have placed them in separate 
chapters, as if they were distinct things. He would surely 
not have devoted one whole chapter to the Tethys and Acalephe, 
and another to the Cnide and Sponge, unless he had meant they 
should be considered as distinct animals. Still there is one 
circumstance that seems in one respect to indicate their iden- 
tity, one species of each appears to be usually fixed, and the 
other free. But this, by itself, does not furnish a satisfactory 
proof. With regard to these Jlcalephes or Cnides of Aristotle 
having any right to be considered as belonging to Linne's 
genus Medusa^ it seems chiefly based upon their name of JVei- 
tles, which probably was given them, from a faculty they 
|X)ssessed of stinging, in some measure, like a nettle, a faculty 
which some of the Medusas are known to possess in a re- 



1 The word I have rendered watery (fAaSsLpoc) means properly without 
hairs; but^««f*» is used by Theophrastus to express moisture, and is used 
here evidently in a similar sense. 

2 Aristot. Hist. Anim. 1. iv. c. 6. 3 Ibid. 1. viii. e. 2. 

4 In the text it is tv toic /uu^otri, but Athenoeus reads iv rots xuw, which 
better agrees with the context. 

6 Gr. TrhoLTAfxaihrii — it may perhaps mean flat rocks. Aristot. Ibid. 1. v. 
c. 16. 



504 APPENDIX. NOTES. 

markable degree.^ But Aristotle does not appear to intimate 
that such an effect follows its touch, except that the fixing of 
its tentacles caused a svveUing. If either of his species is en- 
titled to be considered as a Medusa it must be the smaller ; the 
larger or fixed one appears in one respect to resemble the Am- 
phitrite magnifica :^ they are stated to use the rock to which 
they are fixed as a shell, whence it should seem that they 
retire occasionally into it, like the above animal. With regard 
to his second species, though some parts of his description agree 
with the common jelly-fish, yet their devouring Echini and 
Cockles seems to indicate some animal furnished with a more « 
powerful apparatus for making their way to the animal in- 
habiting these shells. Pliny does not in his description merely 
copy Aristotle; for he speaks of his sea-nettle as producing the 
same effect as the vegetable nettle. Yet he mentions them 
and the sponges as being something intermediate between the 
animal and the plant, which can scarcely apply to our Jelly- 
fish. It seems, I think, probable, that the term in queslioa 
was employed by the ancients, to designate more than one 
group of anijnals, and more particularly the Tunicaries of La- 
marck, both those that are fixed and those that are free. 
Aristotle's fixed species, which he describes as retreating into 
the rocks, as into a shell, will probably one day be found near 
the eastern coast of the Black Sea. It is worth while also to 
inquire whether any animal answering the description of Aris- 
totle's secend species is still eaten, in the winter, by the Greeks, 
customs of that kind seldom changing. 

Note 23, p. 130. — It seems to me most probable that they are 
the animals, and not the pholads, as is usually supposed, which the 
Roman naturalists describes under the name of JDactyle. Pliny 
says of his Dactyli that they are so called, because of their re- 
semblance to the human nail;' in the Pholads this resemblance 
is very slight, but in the razor-shells and some tulip-shells it is 
much more striking. He also observes that (he Dactylus when 
replete with moisture sparkles in the mouth of the eater, and 



1 The stinfring property of many such TcntacuLa, for instance, in Uie 
Medusa and Holothuria, likewise deserves notice. Tliis, which, with some 
modifications, also exists in several plants, appears to bo the lowest degree of 
the, so called, electric power in several fishes, not recurrinn; in the higher 
orders of animals, and perhaps comparable as regards man, to the magnetic 
influence alone. — Cams. i. 47. § GO. 

2 Tubularia vutgnifica, Linn. Tr. v. 22ti. t. ix. 

3 Hist. Nat. \.'\x.c.(j\. 



APPENDIX. NOTES. 505 

that the falling drops also emit light.* If Pliny, in his account 
of this creature, was really speaking of the pholad, it is singu- 
lar he should not mention its habit of boring rocks. 

Note 24, p. 136. — Their byssus has long been celebrated, for it 
is mentioned by Aristotle. Aristotle's mode of expression is sin- 
gular. ^^ *^* viyyctt og^ett ^vovTctt tK t« ^vo-o-h iv to/? ttixyLmivri »ett 

fio^o^ah<riv. He says also when they are deprived of the pinno- 
phylax, they perish.^ Pliny, who mostly copies Aristotle's 
account, does not notice the byssus.^ 

1 His natura in tenebris remote lumine, alio fulgere claro ; et quanta ma- 
gis humorem habeant, lucere in ore mandentium, lucere in manibus, atque 
etiam in solo et veste decidentibus guttis. Ibid. 

2 Hist. Anim. 1. v. c. 10. 3 Bist. Kat. 1. ix. c. 42. 



3o 



INDEX 



Abyss, 13, 483 
Acalepha, 104, 502 
Accipenser, 57 
Acephala, 128 
Achatina, 157 
Acorn barnacle, 190 
Acrita, 80 
Acrocinus, 284 
Actheres, 201, 204, 253, 255 
Actinia, 132 
Adanson, 79 
Addison, 316 
^lian, 234 
Aeroscepsy, 249 
Agardh, 79 
Agassiz, 396 
Agastria, 80 
Aggregate animals, 118 
Air, Introd. Ixiv 
Albatross, 429 
Alca, 428 
Alcyonium, 84 
Alcyon, 86 
Alitrunk, 267 
Alligator, 17, 417 
Ambulacra, 109 
American animals, 494 
Ametabolians, 355 
Ammonites, 11, 169 
Ammophila, 364 
Amoreux, 97 
Amorpha, 79 
Amphitrite, 186, 244 
Amphibians, 262, 265 
Amphiuma, 412 
Amymone, 201 
Anableps, 391 
Ananchinia, 120 



Ananchitis, 114 

Anas, 55 

Anas acuta, 279 

Anatifa, 190 

Androctonus, 347 

Anhyma, 430 

Animals and plants 74, 110, 319, 500 

Animalcules, 80, 81,242 

Annelidans, 179, 257 

Annulosans, 172 

Anolius, Anolis, 255, 417 

Anomalon, 366 

Anser, 55 

Ant's nests, 369 

Ants, 363, 371 

Ants of visitation, 371 

Ants, black, 370 

Antagonist powers, Introd. Iviii, 76, 

465 
Antilope Chickara, 455 
Antilope furcata, 52 
Antilope rupicapra, 70 
Antennae, 249 
Anthobians, 382 
Antichrist, 497 
Antipathes, 94 
Ape, 301 

Aphaniptera, 357, 360 
Aphides, 49 

Aphrodita aculeata, 197 
Aphrodita magnifica, 259 
Aplysia, 164 

Aporobranchians, 338, 352 
Aptenodytes, 71 
Apteryx, 431 
Aquila, 227 
Ara, 38 
Arachnidans, 232, 338 



508 



INDEX. 



Aranea, 340 

Aranea, notacantha, 347 

Araneidans, 339 

Ararat, 25 

Arctomys, 456 

Argonauta, 72, 164 

Argulus, 207 

Argyronauta, 346 

Aristotle, 94, 110, 136, &c. 

Arm, 278 

Armadillo, 221, 500 

Arvicola, 49, 457 

Ascalabotes, 254 

Ascaris, 174 

Ascidians, 117 

Ass, 454 

Astacus Gammarus, 212, 215 

Astacus fluviatilis, 212, 216 

Asteria, 108 

Ateles, 228 

Athanasius, Introd. xxxiv, Ixviii 

Audoin, 67, 200, 341 

Aurelia, 244 

Aye-Aye, 300, 448, 461 

Azote, 79 

Baboon, 301, 463 

Bacillaria, 469 

Bacon, Friar, Introd. xxxix 

Baculites, 11 

Baddeley, 375 

Baker, 350 

Baleena, 450 

Balaenoptera, 450 

Balanites, 190 

Balanus, 150, 190 

Barnacle, 189 

Barbs, 250 

Barrington, 458 

Barton, 449 

Bat-louse, 351 

Bat-mite, 350 

Batrachians, 284 

Bauer, 80, 85 184 

Bdella, 181, 182 

Beak of birds, 292 

Bear, 301, 457 

Beattie, 308 

Beaver, 299, 315, 335,459 



Beeckey, 98, 99, 430 

Bee-cuckow, 434 

Beetles, 285, 376, 379 

Bellevue, 133 

Bembex, 364 

Bennet, 336, 341, 374, 429 

Bimane, 302, 464 

Bipes, 64, 284 

Birds, 3, 53, 218, 269, 283, 327, 331 

Birgus, 214 

Bison, 455 

Bivalve Molluscans, 128 

Blackwall, 286, 345 

Bladder-kelp, 158 

Blatta, 377 

Boa, 281, 415 

Bochart, 160 

Bodianus, 390 

Boerhave, 176 

Boltenia, 123 

Bones, 380 

Bonito, 429 

Bonnet, 7, 176, 415 

Booby, 429 

Borassus, 65 

Bos Americanus, 50 

Bos urus, 455 

Bosc, 17, 65, 105, 157, 167. 181 

Botryllus, 115 

Botryocephalus, 174, 175 

Brain-mite, 475 

Branchiopod, 86, 200 

Branchipus, 199 

Branchiremes, 260 

Brayley, 152 

Bristles, 260 

Brongniart, 407 

Brown, 79, 500 

Bruguiere, 83, 108 

Buccinum, 148, 150 

Buckland, 99, 299 

Bugong, 374 

Bugs, 377 

Bulimus, 157 

Bulla, 148 

BullcBa, 148 

Burrowing Molluscans, 130 

Burying Beetles, 380 

Byssus, 128, 135, 137,505 



INDEX. 



509 



Cactus, 472 


Cheiromys, 300, 461 




Calandra, 382 


Cheiroptera, 272, 448, 464 




Caligus, 207 


Chela, 208 




Callicthys, 265, 392 


Chelifer, 237, 349 




Calosoma, 379 


Chelonia, 71, 265, 434, 450 




Calyptrea, 148 


Cherub, Introd. lii 


Camel, 296, 297, 454 


Cherubim, /wirotZ. xliv, xlvi, lxviii,318 


; 
1 


Camelopardalis, 28], 454 


Chilognathans, 224, 228 


! 


Campagnol, 49 


Chilopodans, 224, 225 


\ 


Campbell, 65 


Chimffira, 61 


'S 


Cancer stagnalis, 204 


Chirotus, 416 


■J 

1 


Cancer msenas, 231 


Chiton, 146, 150 


Canis, 35, 227 


Chlamyphorus, 298, 299, 441, 500 


Carabus, 227 


Chrysomela, 381 




Carcasses, 380 


Cicada, 376 




Cardium, 130 


Cicindela, 332, 379 




Carinaria, 165 


Ciconia alba, 431 




Carlisle, 175 


Ciconia argula, 182 




Carnivora, 227, 462 


Ciconia nigra, 431 




Cartwri. ht, 300, 460 


Cirripedes, 181, 189 




CarM5, 111, 131, 197, 353 


Clamp-shell, 135 




Cassida, 381 


ClasBifica.t.ion, 444 




Cassiopea, 244 


Clausilia, 149 




Castor, 71, 299, 459 


Clavellina, 115 




Casuarius, 272, 283, 433 


Clio, 144, 249 




Cat, 36, 39, 326 


Clouds, Introd. Ixi 




Catcott, 27 


Clupanodon, 61 




Catoblepas, 296, 455 


Clupea, 62 




Caucasian, 40 


Cnide, 502 




Cavia, 456 


Coala, see Koala 




Cavitaries, 172 


Cochleoctonus, 380 




Cellaria, 90 


Cockles, 130, 142 




Cenomyce, 51 


Cock-roach, 377 




Centipedes, 224, 227 


Cod-fish, 59, 394 




Centres, 148, 199, 207 


Coluber, 70 




Cephalopods, 163, 246, 251, 259 


Coleoptera, 358, 378 




Cephalothorax, 205, 236 


Colymbus, 55 




Cerambyx, 381 


Comatula, 194 




Cermatia, 225 


Conchifers, 55 




Cervus, 285 


Concholepas, 148 




Cetaceans, 261, 265, 446, 450 


Condor, 440 




Cetonia, 382 


Condylopes, 127, 197, 259, 279 




Ckabrier, 267, 269 


Coral, 94 




Chffitodon, 403 


Cordylia, 382 




Chalk eggs, 99 


Coronula, 191 




Chameleon, 290 


Crabs, 208, 231 




Chamois, 70 


Crab-spider, 346 




Charadrius Mgypiinu, 18S 


Crangon, 209 




Cheetah, 455 


Cricetua, 457 





5\0 



NDEX. 



Crinoideans, 193 

Crocodile, 17, 417 

Crosse, 417 

Cteniza, 341 

Cuculus, 53 

Culex, 71,86 

Cuvier, 104, 110, 157, 165, 251, 262 

Cyamus, 220 

Cjchrus, 55 

Cyclops, 199, 201, 203 

Cyclopterus, 254 

Cyclostoma, 149 

Cynocephalus 301, 448 

Cyprea, 148, 161 

Cyprinus auratus, 86 

Cyprinus Brama, 472 

Cypris, 199, 260 

Cypselus, 53 

Dactyle, 130,504 
Daldorf, 65 
Dalyell, 81, 172 
Daphnia, 199 
Darkness, Introd. Ixv 
Dasyurus, 449 
£>a?j?/, 19, 183, 323,410 
DeBlainville, 80, 110 
Deer, 285, 294, 455 
De Geer, 199 
Deinotherium, 453 
De la Motte, 309 
Delphinus, 451 
Deluge, 14, 484 
Denon, All 
Depurators, 85 
Dermaptera, 357 
Dermestes, 227, 380 
Deukelzoon, 61 
Dhawalagiri, 14, 25 
Dibranchiata, l(i4, 168 
Didelphis, 449 
Didemnum, 115 
Didus, 30 
Digitigrades, 301 
Diomcdea, 42f) 
Diplostomum, 177, 47 J 
Diplozoon, 177, 251, 472. 474 
Dipneumones, 340 
Diptera, 357, 360 



Dipus, 282 
Discoboles, 254 
Discocephalus, 241, 469 
Distoma, 172 
Dodo, 30, 432 
Doras, 64, 392 
Draco, 274 
Dragons, 16, 406 
Dragon-flies, 268, 375 
Draparnaud, 173 
Dromaius, 433 
Dromedary, 297 
Dufoicr, 236 
Dugong, 452 
Du Trochet, 242 
Dynastidans, 382 
Dyticus, 71, 254 

Eagle, 38, 439, 440 

Ears, 33 

Earthworm, 184, 241 

Echeneis, 254 

Echidna, 233, 298, 449 

Echinococcus, 174 

Echinoderms, 104. 108, 252 

Echinus, 109, 192 

Edentata, 297, 447, 456 

Edwards, 67 

Eggs ox^ Frogs, 329 

Egg-placer, 364 

Ehrenhcrg, 60 

Elater, 322 

Electric-eel, 401 

Electric-fishes, 399 

Electricity, 321 

Elephant, 294, 313.453 

Ellis, 115, 194 

Elytra, 266 

Emu, 26, 272 

Enchelis, 82 

Encrinites, 193 

Encrinus, 195 

Enhydra, 71 

Entimus, 383 

Entomostracans, 199, 208, 25S 

Entozoa, 171,200.470 

Epeira, 285 

E pile mora, 68, 27."> 

Equoroa, 244 



INDEX. 



511 



Erinaceus, 301 
Escallop-shells, 137 
Esox, 227 
Eudora, 244 
Euploea, 374 
Exocostus, 65, 265 
Extinct animals, 9, 20 
Eye of Fishes, 390 
Eye-worms, 471 

Fabricius, 234 
Falco, 227 
Fasciola, 172, 174 
Feathers, 270 
Feelers, 249 
Felis, 227 
Filaria, 174 
Fins, 261,264 
Fire, Introd. Ixiv 
Fire-flies, 374, 382 
Firmament, Introd. l\ 
Fishes, 332, 386, 395 
Fishing-frog, 250, 395 
Fistulidans, 108, 115 
Flagrum, 231 
Flea, 360 

Flesh-fly, 311, 262 
Flight, 271 
Flight of Bats, 272 
FlightofBirds, 271, 291 
Flight of Insects, 267 
Fly-shooter, 403 
Fluke, 175, 179 
Food of Animals, 319 
Forest-fly, 357 
Forficula, 378 
Fossil Animals, 492 
Fox, 331 
French, 308, 311 
Freycinet, 213 
Frigate-bird, 429 
Frog-hopper, 378 
Fulica, 55 
Furia, 475 

Gad-fly, 361 
Gadns iEgelfinus, 59 
Gadus Morhua, 59 
Galathea, 260 



Galeodes, 235, 236 

Galeopithecus, 273 

Gallinago, 56 

Gallinula, 56 

Galls, 364 

Gall-flies, 364 

Gallus, 433 

Gally-worm, 224 

Gamasus, 205 

Garum, 60 

Gaspard, 155 

Gastropods, 144, 145, 247 

Gecko, 254, 255, 290 

Gecarcinus carnifex, 66 

Gecarcinus Uca, 67 

Gelasimus pugillator, 212 

Gelasimus vocans, 211 

Gelatines, ] 04, 243 

Geoffro2j, 417 

Geophilus electricas, 226, 253 

Gills, 387 

Giraffe, 281, 454 

Globulina, 87 

Gloraeris, 224 

Glow-worm, 322, 383 

Glutton, 227 

Gmelin, 58 

Gnat, 362 

Gnu, 296, 455 

Goats-beard, 320 

Goby, 390 

Gods of the Heathen, Introd. Iti, 477, 

479 
Goldfuss, 424 
Gonyleptes, 349 
Gordius, 7 
Gould, 437 
Grallatores, 57 
Grant, 197, 247 
Grasshoppers, 284, 377 
Gravitation, 317 
Gray, 116, 187 
Gregarious Animals, 118 
Ground-beetles, 379 
Gryllotalpa, 280, 289 
Guana, 417, 419 
Gubernacula, 274 
Guettard, 195 
Guilding, 146, 187, 416 



512 



INDEX. 



Guinea-worm, 471 
Gymnotus, 401 
Gyrinus, 71 

Haddock, 59 
Hag, 398 
Hagenbach, 379 
Hair, 35, 269, 480 
Halicore Dugong, 452 
Halicore Tabernaculum, 452 
Haliotis, 148, 150, 249 
Haltica, 285, 381 
Hamster, 11, 457 
Hancock, 65 
Hand, 302 
Harpalus, 227 
Harris, 83 

Hearing of Fishes, 391 
Hearne, 300 
Heat, 321 

Heavens, Introd. Iv, 493 
Hectocotyle, 474 
Hedgehog, 301, 456 
Hedysarum, 79, 320 
Heliconia, 375 
Heliocentris, 340 
Helix, 147, 151, 249 
Helix hortensis, 152 
Helix pomatia, 153 
Helminthologists, 8 
Helshum, 435 
Hemiptera, 376, 378 
Hermas, 73 
Hermit-crabs, 214 
Herodotus, Introd. Ivi, 181 
Herring, 60 
Herschel, 12 
Hesychius, 182, 189 
Heteropods, 144, 162 
Hexapods, 229 
Hexastoma, 474 
Hippodamia, 375 
Hippopotamus, 294, 453 
Homdineans, 174 
Hirudo, 180, 252 
Hirundo esculenta, 328 
Hirundo riparia, 328 
Hirundo rustica, 54, 327 
Hirundo urbica, 328 



Hister, 381 

Hive-bee 319, 368 

Holman, 367 , 

Holothuria, 244 

Homaloptera, 357, 360 

Home, 132, 399 

Homoptera, 358, 376 

Hooke, 83 

Hop, 320 

Hope, 365 

Hoplia, 382 

Hornets, 366 

Hornet-flies, 362 

Horns, 32, 376 

Horse, 453 

Horsefield, 437 

House-cricket, 377 

Humble-bees, 288 

Humboldt, 43, 402 

Humming-birds, 38 

Hump, 34 

Hurry, 182 

Huso, 57 

Hyaena, 227 

Hyalsea, 145 

Hybernation, 320, 322 

Hydatigera, 174 

Hydatis, 177, 471 

Hydra, 80, 89, 243 

Hydrargyra, 65 

Hydrocampa, 71 

HydrophilidsB, 71 

Hydrophytes, 87 

Hyla, 290 

Hymenoptera, 299, 363, 366, 371, 456 

lanthina, 157 
Ichneumon, 365, 384 
Ichthyosaurus, 479 
Idotea, 230 
Jenner, 53, 54, 328 
Jews, 43, 498 
Iguana, 22, 410 
Iguanodon, 21, 22 
Indicator, 434 
Indris, 463 

Infusories, 72, 80, 83, 501 
Ink ofCuttle Fish, 166 
Inoceramus, 11 



[?»DEX. 



513 



Insects, 356 

Instinct, 306, 317, 319, 322 

Integuments, 441, 500 

Intellect, 313, 327 

Interagents, 317 

Invertebrata, 278 

Job son, 17 

Johnson, 172 

Jones, 487 

loterium, 230 

IrencBus, Introd. Ixvii 

Irradiation, Introd. Ixvi 

Isis, 195, 318 

Isopods, 230 

lulus 187, 224, 228 

Jurine, 267 

Justin, M., Introd. Ixviii 

Ivy, 320 

Kanguroo, 26, 27, 282, 442 

Kamichi, 430 

Kircher, 11 

Kidd, 290 

King, 83, 142 

King-crab, 199, 200, 205, 23d 

Koala, 27, 300 

Kotzebue, 203 

Kraken, 165 

Lacepede, 61 

Lacordaire, 322, 380, 382 

Lace- winged flies, 375 

Lagomys, 458 

Lamarck, Introd. xxiv, 80, 83, 121 

Langouste, 215 

Landiorn-flies, 376 

La Place, Introd. xxiii, 11, 15 

Laplysia, 146, 148, 164, 249 

Larvae, 281 

Latham, 421 

Latreille, 127, 192, 198, 235, «fec. 

Law, Introd. xxxiii, 162 

Leach, ^l 

Leather-devourers, 380 

Leech, 180, 240 

Le Clerc, 7 

Leeuwenhoeck, 175 

Legs, 274, 280 

Lemmings, 457 

3 p 



Lemur, 301 

Lemmus amphibius, 71 

Lemmus oeconomus, 49, 457 

Lemmus vulgaris, 49 

Lepadites, 190, 191 

Lepas, 189 

Lepidoptera, 358 

Lerneans, 200, 204 

Le Sueur -[21,142 

Leucophrj's, 82 

Leviathan, 406, 418 

Libellulina, 71 

Lice, 7, 481 

Lightfoot, 5 

Ligia, 230 

Limax, 148, 249 

Limnia, 170 

Limnoria, 131 

Limulus, 199, 205 

Limpets, 147 

Linguatula, 174 

Linne, 8, 14'< 

Lipurus, 300, 449 

Lister, 340 

Lithotrya, 190 

Lobster, common, 215, 231 

Lobster, thorny, 215 

Locusts, 48, 377 

Loligopsis, 247 

Lophius, 262, 395, 404 

Loricaria, 265 

Loxia, 276 

Lumbricinans, 180 

Lumbricus, 7, 184 

Lycoris, 187 

Lyell, Introd. xxxii, 29 

Mackarel, 59 
Mackenzie, 62 
Mac Leay, 171, 189, 192 
Macrocercus, 38 
Macropodia, 209 
Macropus, 282, 449 
Madox, 181 
Madrepora, 96 
Malacostracans, 198, 220 
Malte-Brun, 12,28,499 
Malapterurus, 400 
Malthus, 395, 404 



A14 



IKDEX. 



Mammalians, 326, 331,>441 

Mammary organs, 441 

Mammoth, 482 

Man, 4, 463 

Manatee, 262, 452 

Manis, 298, 441, 500 

Manitrunk, 267 

Mantell, 20, 21, 194 

Manticora, 379 

Mantis, 377 

Mantis-crabs, 209 

Marmot, 456 

Marsupians, 300, 442, 447, 449 

Marsupites, 194 

Martin, 182 

Mastodon, 483 

Afatter, 323 

Medusa, 108, 243 

Megalosaurus, 20, 22 

Megatherium, 441, 500 

Meleagrina, 139 

Melolonthidans, 382 

Menopoma, 412 

Mergus, 55 

Merian, 371 

Metabolians, 355, 356 

Metamorphosis, 202, 359 

Migrations, 47 

Millepedes, 224, 227 

Miller, 194, 195 

Mites, 350 

Mola, 393, 474 ^ 

Mole, 301 

Mole-cricket, 280, 289, 377 

Molluscans, 126, 142, 158, 256 

Monas, 87, 256, 472 

Mongol, 40 

Monitor, 22, 417 

Monkey, 301 

Monoceros, 150 

Monodon, 451 

Monoculus, 189, 199 

Monothyra, 143 

Monotremcs 233, 297, 445, 448 

Montague, 351 

Moongeeara, 369 

More, 323 

Mormolyce, 379 

Motion, 239 

Mullcr, 83, 172, 472 



Murex, 159 
Muskdeer, 454 
Mycetophagus, 381 
My gale, 341 

Myriapods, 223, 228, 258 
Myrmecophaga, 298 
Myrmica, 368 
Mytilus, 139 
Myxine, 255 
Myoxus, 456 

Nais, 173 
Nandu, 432 
Narwhal, 451 
Natatores, 57 
Natatory Organs, 259 
Nature, Introd, xxx 
Nauplius, 201 
Nautilus, 162, 246 
Necrophaga, 227 
Necrophagus, 227 
Necrophorus, 227 
Negro, 40 
Nephrops, 215 
Nere'ideans, 180, 186, 25'< 
Nereis, 187 
Nerita, 147 
Neritina, 147 
Nests, Birds, 328 
Nests, Fishes, 392 
Neuroptera, 358, 375 
Nibblers, 899 
Mcholson, 402 
Nipples, 442 
Nicothoe, 207 
Nirmus, 71 
Nitrogen, 74 
mtzck, 438 
JVordinann, 200, 472 
Numenius, 56 
Nycteribia, 351 

Oak-gall, 365 
Obisium, 237, 3^19 
Ocypode, 211 
Ocythoe, 167 
Octopus, 165, 245 
Oestrus, 361 
Olivier, 21 1 , 235 
Oiiiscus, 230 



NDEX. 



51, 



Operculum, 150, 151 

Ophidians, Ji27, 258, 234, 328 

Ophiotheres, 284 

Opossum, 20, 450 

Oppian, 1G8 

Orbicula, 148 

Orders of Animals, Infusories, 83 

•Polypes, 89 

Radiaries, 104 ' 

Tunicaries, 117 

Molluscans, 128, 144 

Cephalopods, 1G4 

Worms, 171 

Annelidans, 179 

Cirripedes, 189 

Entomostracans, 200 

Crustaceans, 210 

Myriapods, 223 

Arachnidans, 338 

Pseudarachnidans, 349 

Acaridans, 350 

Insects, 356 

Fishes, 395 

Reptiles, 409 

Birds, 424 

Mammalians, 445 
Orchesia, 211 

Omithorhynchus, 27, 233, 297, 448 
Osculant Orders, 35G 
Oscillatoria, 78, 87 
Osier, 130, 133 
Osphronemus, 393 
Ostrich, 17, 272, 432, 
Ovibos, 51 
Ovis Aries, 35 

Owjc7i,lll, 162,167,246, 408, &c., &c. 
Oxygen, 74, 79 
Oxyurus, 174 
Oyster, 138 

Pachyderms, 293, 446, 453 

Paddles, 265 

Pagh, 428 

Pagurus, 212 

Pagurus Bernhardus, 213 

Pagurus clibanarius, 213 

Pagurus Diogenes, 213 

Palaemon,209 

Palamedea cornuta, 430 



Pahy. 6b 

Palinurus. 215 

Pallas, 57, 235, 458 

Palpi. 231, 233, 249 

Pandalus, 20i) 

Papilio, 373 

Parasites, 204, 356, 365 

Parnassius, 70 

Parrot, 38 

Parts reproduced, 392 

Patella, 147 

Pearls, 139 , 

Pearl-fishery, 140 

Peeten, 137 

Pedimane, 450 

Pediculus, 7 

Pediculus Nigritarum, 46, 482 

Pedipalps, 347 

Pediremes, 260 

Pegasus, 265 

Pelecanus, 292 

Pennant, 49 

Pentacrinites, 194 

Pentacrinus, 195 

Pentelasmis, 150, 190 

Perca fluviatilis, 204 

Perca lucioperca, 204 

Perca scandens, 214 

Perch-pest, 204 

Perchers, 436 

Percival, 183 

Periophthalmus, 390 

Peripatus, 187, 257 

Peron, 95, 120, 121 

Periwinkle, 148 

Petaurus, 274 

Petricola, 133 

Phalangista, 274, 449 

Phalangium, 237 

Phalaropes, 431 

Phanoeus, 381 

Phascochcerus, 294 

Phascolornys, 449 

Phito, Introd. iviii, Ixyii, 73 

Phoca, 71, 312 

Pholas, 132, 135, 504 

Phosphoric animals, 95, 101 

Phrynus, 235, 237 

Phyllium, 377 



516 



INDEX. 



Phyllodoce, 187 

Phyllosoma, 220 

Physalis, 106 

Physsophora, 104 

Phytomyza, 376 

Picus, 292 

Pika, 458 

Pileopsis, 148 

Pimelodus, 412 

Pinna, 136 

Pinnophylax, 136 

Pinnotheres, 136 

Pioneer-spider, 341 

Pisidius, 307 

Plague of flies, 377 

Planaria, 172, 471 

Planorbis, 169 

Plant-animals, 83, 240 

Plantigrades, 301 

Plants and animals, 74, 116, 319 

Platalea, 256 

Plato, 79 

Plesiosaurus, 17, 479 

Pliny, 84, 136, 168 

Ploceus, 436 

Plumier, 160 

Pcecilopods, 200, 207 

Poison-fangs, 233 

Pqli, 134, 136, 138 

Polly xenus, 224 

Polygastrica, 83 

Polypary, 93, 97 

Polype, 3,83, 89 

Polypi natantes, 90 

Polypi tubiferi, 90 

Polypi vaginati, 93 

Polystoma, 474 

Pompilus, 364 

Pontoppidan, 165 

Population, 498 

Poulpe, 165 

Poultry, 36 

Power, 83 

Prairie-dog, 456 

Predaceans, 301, 447, 461 

Prchensory toe, 302 

Proboscis, 295 

Proteus, 19, 22, 410 

ProtophyUi, 78 



Protozoa, 78, 83 
Pseudoscorpions, 349 
Psophia, 430 
Pterodactylus, 423 
Pteromyzon, 255 
Pteropods, 144, 162,259 
Pteroptes, 350 

Pulex irritans, 360 , 

Pulex penetrans, 7 
Pulmonaries, 338 
Punitive animals, 7 
Pupipara, 357, 360, 365 
Purple die, 161 
Purpura, 160 
Pygolampis, 322, 383 
Pyrites, 103 
Pyrosoma, 95, 120, 240 
Python, 415 

Quadrumanes, 39,' 301, 448, 462 
Quadrupeds, 3 
Quagga, 52 

Radiaries, 171 

Raffles, 93 

Rajinesque, 167 

Raia, 262 

Rumond, 38 

Ranatra, 71 

Rat, 49 

Rat-hare, 458 

Rathke, 231 

Raveners, 439 

Rays, 393 

Razor-shell, 129 

Reaumur, 133, 216 

Rectrices, 275 

Rein-deer, 51, 285 

Reptiles, 328, 332 

Reptiles, system of, 408 

Requins, 393 

Rhea, 453 

Rhinoceros, 11, 483, 294, 453 

Rhizostoma, 106 

Rhizotrogus, 382 

Richardson, 34, 48, 50, 51, 52, 299, 400 

Ripipliorus, 365 

Rodents, 299, 326, 447, 456, 461 

Rogct, 258 



INDEX. 



517 



Rosa, 96 
Rosel, 290 

Rotatories, 82, 83, 241 
Rotifera, 241 
Rove-beetles, 379 
Ruminants, 296, 447, 454 
Rumphius, 96 
Ruppel, 452 
Rusconi, 413 

Sabella, 185, 186 

Salaraandra, 413 

Salamandra aquatica, 71 

Salaraandra platycaula, 329, 413 

Salmo alpinus, 62 

Salmo eperlanus, 62 

Salmo Hucho, 62 

Salmo Fario, 62 

Salmo Salar, 62 

Salmo thymallus, 62 

Salmo Trutta, 62 

Salpa, 119, 240, 469 

Sanguisuga, 180, 252 

Sarcophaga carnaria, 227 

Sarcophagus, 361 

Sarcoptes scabiei, 7 

Sarcorhamphus, 69 

Saurians, 16, 265, 284, 329 

Suuvages, 341 

Savigny, 120, 122, 180, 181 , 236 

Saw-flies, 357 

Saxicava, 133 

Say, 449 

Scales of fishes, 387 

Scales of wings, 269 

Scaphites, 11 

Scarabaeus, 378, 380 

Sckeuchzer, 19 

Scillaea, 145 

Scolex, 182 

Scolopax gallinago, 292 

Scolopax gallinula, 292 

Scolopax rusticola, 292 

Scolopendra, 187, 224, 225 

Scolopendra phosphorea, 226 

Scomber Pelamis, 474 

Scomber Scombrus, 59 

Scomber Thynnus, 60 

Scoresby, 450 



Scorpions, 237, 343 

Scutigera, 225 

Sea-anemones, 115 

Sea-devils, 393 

Sea-pens, 90 

Sea-urchins, 99 

Sea-unicorn, 451 

Segestria perfida, 345 

Segestria senoculator, 344 

Sepia, 164 

Sepiola, 245 

Seps, 284 

Seraphim, Introd. Ixix, note 

Serpents, 17, 258, 406 

Serpula, 185 

Serpuleans, 180 

Sertularia, 90 

Setiger, 458 fc 

Setiremes, 260 

Shark, 17, 390, 393 

Shaw, 204 

Sheep, Guinea, 35 

Sheep, Merino, 35 

Sheep, Parnassian, 35 

Ship- worms, 131, 134 

Siliquaria, 185 

Silpha, 227 

Siluridans, 263 

Simia, 301 

Singing-birds, 420 

Siren, 17, 408, 410 

Sky, Introd. Iviii 

Sloths, 299 

Slugs, 249 

Snails (eyes), 152, 249 

Scent of fishes, 391 

Solen, 129 

Soliped, 289 

Solomon's Ant, 371 

Solpuga, 234, 236, 257 

Spallanzani, 54, 81 

Sparrman, 50, 414 

Spatangus, 114 

Spence, 54, 307, 333 

Spermophilus, 456 

Sphargis, 17, 265 

Sphinx, 373 

Sphodrus, 29 

Spiders, 286, 332, 33^ 



518 



INDEX. 



Spiders, retiaries, 287, 345 
Spiders, trap-door, 342, 343 
Spider's web, 339 
Spines, 110 
Spirit, ascent to, 323 
Spirit, evil, 394 
Spirit of Nature, 323 
Spirula, 170, 247 
Spondylus, 138 
Spongia, 89, 93 
Spoon-bill, 292 
Squilla Mantis, 210, 219 
Squalus, maximus, 393 
Squirrel, common, 274 
Squirrel, flying, 266 
Stag-beetles, 268 
Stapelia, 311 
Staphylinus, 379 
Staunton, 499 
Star-fish, 108 
Stetchbury, 182 
Stelleridans, 108, 181 
Stenosoma, 230 
Stone-borers, 129 
Stone-eaters, 133 
Storge, 325, 336, 422 
Stratyomis, 86 
Strepsiptera, 357 
Strix, 439 
Strongylus, 174 
Struthio-camelus, 432 
Subterranean-fishes, 412 
Succinea, 156 
Suckers, 110, 181,250 
Sula Bassana, 429 
Sun-flower, 319 
Sus Babyrussa, 295 
Sus Scrofa, 294 
Swallow, 55, 327 
Swimmers, 427 
Swine, 33, 42, 294, 453 
Sycophant-beetle, 379 
Sykes, 368 
Sylvia cisticola, 437 
Symbols, 80 
System, nervous, 333 
Systems, 126 

Tabernacle, Introd. xliii, xlv 



Tachypetes. aquila. 429 
Topnia, 174. 175 
Tailor bird, 436 
Tails, 275 ' 
Talpa, 301 
Tape worms, 175 
Tapir, 453 
Tardigrades, 298 
Teeth of fishes, 391 
Tellina, 142 
Tettigonia, 321 
Tettix, 376 

Temperature, connected with torpi- 
dity, 321 , 457 
Temple of God, Introd. xliii 
Tenrec, 457 
Tentacles, Polypes, 242 
Tentacles, Annelidans.Cirripedes. 250 
Tentacles, Cephalopods, 245 
Tentacles, Fishes, 250 
Tentacles, Molluscans, 249 
Tentacles, Radiaries, 243 
Tentacles, Tunicaries, 244 
Tenthredo, 364 
Terebratula, 141 
Teredo, 129, 131 
Termes lucifuga. 372 
Te thy dans, 117 
Tethys, 145 
Tetrabranchiata, 164 
Tetragnatha, 234 
Tetrao, 276 
Tetrapneumones, 340 
Thalassina, 210 
Thalydans, 117 
Thelyphonus, 235, 237 
Theocritus, 182 
Thompson, 192 
Thunny, 60, 390 
Thysanura, 355 
Tiger-beetles, 332, 379 
Tiger-beetles, grubs of, 379 
Toads in marble, 407 
Todus, 183 

Trachelipods, 144, 149, 159 
Tree Ant, 368, 371 
Tree Lobster, 214 
Trnnblcy, 88, 91 
Trie hoc hu 9. 71 



I 

i 



INDEX. 



519 



Trichoptera, 71 , 357, 375 

Trichocephalus, 174 

Tridacne, 135 

Trigonia, 142 

Trig0^, 339 

Trilobites, 221 

Trionyx, ferox, 410, 418 

Tristoma, 474 

Trochilus, 181,182, 292 

Trochus, 151 

Trox, 381 

Tubicinella, 150 

Tubularia, 186 

Tunicaries, IIG 

Turbo, 147 

Turdus, 438 

Turdus gryllivorus, 49 

Turdus pilaris, 56 

Turtle, 423 

Twining plants, 320 

Two hands of Nature, Introd. xxxiv 

Typhon, 348 

Unclean animals, 226 

Univalves, 144 

Unger, 79 

Uropoda vegetans, 352 

Ursus, 301 

Ursus Americanus, 52 



Virey, 66, 317 
Volucella, 361 
Voluta aethiopica, 249 
Von Baer, 172, 207, 
Vorticella, 205, 241, 374 
Vultur barbatus, 37 
Vultur percnopterus, 37 

Wasps, 366, 367 
Waders, 283 
Walckenaer 235, 340 
Weavers, 344 
Weaver birds, 436 
Web, spider's, 339 
Westwood, 231 
Whale, 16, 37, 84, 107, 450 
Wheel-animal, 241 
White ants, 372, 375 
White coral, 96 
Windpipe, 421 
Wings, 266, 270 
Wings of insects, 267 
Wing-shell, 157 
Wryneck, 435 

Xiphias, 474 

Yarrel, 422, 431 
Yunx torquilla, 435 



Varieties, 32 

Vehicle for the soul, 480 

Vellela, 105 

Vermetus, 185 

Vertebrata, 278 

Verulam, Lord, Introd. xxxiv, xxxvi 

Vespa, 365 

Vibrio, 80, 83, 85 



Zebu, 34 
Zoea, 192 
Zoobotryon, 470 
Zoomyza, 376 
Zoophaga, 227, 447 
Zoophagous animals, 227 
Zoophytes, 29 



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Deacidified using ihe Bookkeeper process 
Neutralizing agent Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date Dec. <>004 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PREStRVATIOK 

1 1 1 Thomson Parti PnvP 
Cr.inborry Townsli i 
(7.'!4) 779-2111 



